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Deleted Member
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Dear Bros, though there has been a lot of discussion advising not to buy gems, etc. from Bangkok, I was wondering if one can buy gold? I've heard the gold sold in Thailand is of pretty good quality. Could anybody tell me any reliable place where I may buy some gold jewellery (let's say around Baht 5000 or so).
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Thai Girls : Meet Sexy Thai Girls
Posted on: 2:37 am on Oct. 3, 2002
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chateaujade
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Chinatown's Yaowaraj Road, the main drag down there is the best place to buy Thai gold.
Thai gold is almost pure. Gold is described of course in karats, even numbered only, so 24K, 22K, 20K, 18K etc.
18K is nominally 75% gold, this is a European favorite with 25% alloying.
Thai gold is between 22K and 24K, typically around 98% gold. As jewelry goes it is soft and brass colored, but guess what, that's what pure gold looks like. Westerners are accustomed to 10K, 14K, at best 18K alloys.
Western jewellers and goldsmiths will criticize Thai gold as too sort to work properly, as having inferior craftsmanship, etc but they can't fault it for being almost PURE.
Also Thai gold shops sell gold by baht weight (a baht tong (baht gold) being roughly half a troy ounce. And the labor content is very small whereas in the West the labor content is HUGE. That is why pawnshops and gold shops will buy the Thai gold back from you for a relatively large percentage of what you paid for it -- that's portability. Thai gold can be turned back into cash very readily for maybe 75% of current value.
Just try that in the States with your 14K overpriced shit. You will lose all the labor content and middleman's take and then pay for assay and refining and then get at best spot price and end up losing close to 100% of what you paid, which is why nobody does it but thieves. And maybe not them.
Any other questions?
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Bangkok Women : Meet Sensual Bangkok Women
Posted on: 2:58 am on Oct. 3, 2002
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snowbird
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Hi CJ -
Interesting info about Thai gold - coming from a gold producing area myself, I'd like to know where and how they mine it. Is it mined in Thailand, or in adjacent countries, and is it mostly placer mining or hardrock?
Although there is lots of gold jewelry for sale around here, you wouldn't find much of that purity; it simply doesn't stand up to wear and tear being that soft. Rings are usually 10K, for example.
Regards
snowbird
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Thai Girls : Meet Sexy Thai Girls
Posted on: 9:29 am on Oct. 3, 2002
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chateaujade
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There are some small gold mines in Thailand but most of the metal is imported for the trade.
I couldn't tell you anything technical about the mines.
The Pakis, Indians, Chinese and Thais all love their soft gold. Chains, bangles, rings, ear rings. The bracelets and necklaces are held closed with soft S-shaped clasps and IMHO those need to be replaced with better fasteners ASAP as they WILL break or bend open.
Rings are indeed very flimsy at 22K but no one here seems to mind.
The portability is the over-riding consideration here. It's like a low tech ATM card. Cash crunch, run to the pawnshop or back to the gold shop.
One baht tong (just under 16 grams or about half a troy oz) is presently 6700 Thai baht. That includes labor and profit. At 43 to the US$ that's $156 US. Very close to $312 for a troy oz. What's the spot market today, about $280? So, it's about 10% over spot, give or take a little for errors in my figures.
That's a small premium to pay over the bullion value.
Take that back to the shop or to a pawnbroker and you will get c.5600 baht cash. So you lose $25 on $156 or c.15%, you get 85% of your money back, and 10% of that 15% was labor/profit. So you lost 5% on the gold itself.
Compare that to trying to recover money from gold jewelry of 10-14-18K in the West.
Labor content is hundreds or thousand of % of metal value and 25 to 65% of the weight is nonprecious.
Then the assayers and smelters go to work on your end of the take.
It's a non-starter. Can't get there from here unless you are a thief and maybe not then.
Westerners pay an enormous premium for their alloyed (adulterated?) gold, and can't recoup.
Asians like their gold pure and readily convertible with high recovery rates to cash.
One is jewelry in the safe, other is like money in the bank.
Of course, gold fluctuates just as currencies can do.
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Bangkok Girls : Meet Sexy Bangkok Girls
Posted on: 10:03 am on Oct. 3, 2002
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chateaujade
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But if someone wants to be a gold bug then they want 999 fine as mint uncirculated coins, or bars. Bars can be bought in Thailand in various sizes and weights but I am unsure about buying 999 fine here.
S.Africa, CIS, Irian Jaya or Australia?
I'm a New Orleans boy and Freeport McMoran are from my home town. That's the Irian Jaya operation. Used to be Freeport Sulfur Co., I used to have a molded paperweight of sulfur on my desk when I was a kid, from Freeport.
Then there's the seabed but those nice hot sinks aren't being explited yet, all that inconvenient Law of the Sea muddle from the UN. Bother.
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Thai Women : Meet Matured Thai Women
Posted on: 10:11 am on Oct. 3, 2002
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ccvvbb
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If you are interested in nuggets check out my brothers gold auction site, buy or sell gold and gold jewelry. A ton of gold information and links. See you in LOS in about 3 weeks, how is the weather lately? Has the Nana hotel completed their new pool yet?
http://www.motherlodegold.com/
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Bangkok Women : Meet Beautiful Thai Girls
Posted on: 12:25 am on Oct. 4, 2002
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Ballsburstin
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ccvvbb,
Stayed at the Nana Sep 23rd, pool project still underway, but not finished yet.
- Balls
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Bangkok Girls : Meet Attractive Thai Girls
Posted on: 2:49 am on Oct. 4, 2002
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Deleted Member
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Thanks CJ.
It really helps!
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Thai Girls : Meet Active Thai Girls
Posted on: 2:35 am on Oct. 7, 2002
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chateaujade
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Back in the late 80s there was a highly profitable racket is smuggling Thai gold to India (and probably Pakistan). South Asian smugglers hired farang to carry in baht chains and "smugglers bars" (small ingots) and paid them a nice fee based on their risk. The object was to beat the tax in the destination countries. I do not know if this racket is still going on, I never participated and I didn't think much of the farang that I knew (casyually) who did, nor did I or do I much care for the South Asian gangsters behind this. Personally I would rather sit in a glass booth with 7500 scorpions like the woman here who is going for a Guiness Book entry...
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Thai Women : Meet Matured Thai Women
Posted on: 2:42 am on Oct. 7, 2002
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MrJoe
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I knew, better than I care to admit, a lot of the falangs and south asian gangsters you speak of, and their scam; Generally speaking, you were correct in your low opinion of them IMO.
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Bangkok Girls : Meet Attractive Thai Girls
Posted on: 3:20 am on Oct. 7, 2002
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