People have been trading silver and gold for many thousands of years. They have surprised everybody by not only retaining their value throughout the years and the fall of economies and empires, they’ve also gained value during this time. It shouldn’t surprise anyone to learn that there is a major demand for gold and silver during turbulent economic times like right now.
Economists and other investors claim that it’s best to spend a portion of your overall assets to invest in precious metals. They add stability to your portfolio because they have an inverse trading effect to the stock market. When the stock market goes down in value during tough economic times, the value of gold tends to rise and creates a stock market crash cushion. This will help you maintain your wealth during the toughest times in the economy.
Gold Trust Financial is currently one of the main players in the precious metal space making it possible to invest in silver and gold. Are they really a legitimate company though? And if we can prove their legitimacy, is it worth it to actually invest with them based on their practices and past history?
IMPORTANT – before we get too far in this review, we’d like you to know we’ve vetted quite a few companies in this space.
We know that selecting a company to work with is a major financial decision and something not to take lightly. InvestingInGold.com has put in extensive research spanning many years in order to compile a list of the 5 highest recommended companies for this year.
==> See our #1 recommended company for precious metals investing
We urge you to view the links to see where Gold Trust Financial stacks up against the competition.
Gold Trust Financial Company Info
This company is one of many within the precious metals investing space. Their headquarters is located in Santa Monica, and according to LinkedIn they have four employees. Although, they haven’t updated this page or any other social media in many years. Additionally, it doesn’t appear that they’ve updated their website for a while either.
In fact, their website domain doesn’t even exist any longer. We had to use Yelp and LinkedIn to find out information about this company.
According to Google, they are still in business and their store closes at 5 PM. This company sells precious metals in the US to many people throughout the country. The coins and bullion they sell are made of platinum, gold, palladium, and silver. According to LinkedIn, you must make a purchase over the phone or through their website. Obviously, their website doesn’t exist any longer. And at this point we cannot find a working phone number either. So it doesn’t look like it’s even possible to place an order with this company.
If you make a purchase from this company – if it’s even possible still – they will ship it using FedEx. Customers must sign for the package when making a purchase, which is likely a good thing because they keep your investments safe and protected.
They have received previous reviews from customers on Trustlink, although they appear to have completely vanished off of the Internet at this point.
Additionally, besides selling precious metals, they also help customers set up a precious metals IRA account. Their IRA services make it possible to buy precious metals with IRS approval, which are then stored in an official depository.
We couldn’t discover any information about specific custodians that they may have partnered with. It’s also difficult to learn about the gold IRA services that they supposedly provide. We have no idea if they have valid experts helping customers set up their retirement portfolios, or if you have to handle the paperwork on your own when doing business with this company.
The top companies focusing on gold IRA accounts have experts in a house that will take you by the hand and walk you through the process from beginning to end. They’ll point out the particular paperwork that needs your signature, work directly with your custodian, help you pick and choose the right vault and have it all set up, and they will even provide services for a 401(k) the IRA rollover to fund your account. Lastly, they’ll help you choose the best precious metals to help you reach your retirement goals.
Can this company do the same? It’s hard to tell because there is so little information about Gold Trust Financial online and none of their websites or social media pages are active.
Is It a Scam Doing Business with Gold Trust Financial?
In truth, it looks like gold trust financial is actually a legitimate company. They have solid reviews on Trustlink. They do not have BBB accreditation though. And the company has been in business for almost 30 years, yet they have a D- rating with the Better Business Bureau. This is a major red flag and a bad sign.
Whether or not the company is legitimate doesn’t matter because third-party ratings are surely lacking. They do not have BBB reviews but they did have two complaints in the past three years that were closed out.
Complaints from Customers
A major complaint is that they marked up their coins much higher than they should have and above their worth. The customer couldn’t liquidate their coins for the same value because the markup was so high and they were mad that they got ripped off.
Another customer made a complaint in the same way. They paid up to 20% markup on coins against their actual value. They tried calling the salesperson about the discrepancy, but their calls were never returned.
Another customer was looking for a refund because the company charged them four times more than they were supposed to per coin.
The company has never attempted to address any of the complaints made against them. This is alarming to say the least. And it appears the company used shady and underhanded tactics to charge their customers more money than they were supposed to. This is basically a scam if true. If not, the salesman’s actions were very manipulative and pushy at best.
Positive Reviews from Customers
On Trustlink, we get a very different picture than we previously knew about. On this site, they received a 4.9 out of five stars based on 24 reviews. This is really odd since the company has never received a review on the Better Business Bureau website. We do not know if these reviews are legitimate or fake.
If they were real, the customers would have had many great things to say. But then again, they haven’t had a new review posted about them since 2014, so they are old and outdated. The complaints on the Better Business Bureau website were made in 2018. Maybe the company was good once but began disappointing customers later on in the future.
Some positive customer reviews include:
- They have an educated and patient staff
- They provide excellent customer service
- Customers achieved real gold IRA growth and positive results
- Customers were willing to recommend them to friends and family
As previously mentioned, these positive reviews were posted eight years ago, so taken with a grain of salt. Their negative reviews were posted much more recently.
Is This Company Actually Defunct?
There is much evidence saying that this company existed in the past, but we really cannot claim whether or not they are actively operating at the moment. Even more alarming, if they did close their doors it’s difficult to figure out why it happened.
The company still has a page on the Better Business Bureau website, but they aren’t accredited with them. They’ve never received a review on the website, and 2018 was the last time anyone filed a complaint. The Trustlink reviews are outdated and written back in 2014. It’s nearly impossible to find current information about the company.
As a matter of fact, their website doesn’t even work any longer. Did they take it down on purpose? Did their domain expire? Will never know for sure. But they didn’t bother fixing it, which indicates that customers aren’t banging down their door to buy precious metals from them.
The other problem is they have complaints made against them on the Better Business Bureau and they’ve basically disappeared. They haven’t responded to these complaints and it’s wrong. A previous customer was charged 400% more than he was supposed to pay and they basically stole thousands of dollars from him.
The company hasn’t used their twitter accounts since 2015. At one time, they may have tweeted about an article on their website, but when you click and it takes customers to the page of a company that provides search engine optimization services.
They weren’t active on Twitter all that much to begin with. They only made a half a dozen tweets between 2013 and 2015. They also have a Facebook page for Gold Trust Financial but this page has been inactive since 2013. They have a post with a link to an article on Bloomberg, but it doesn’t really make sense in relation to the company.
According to Yelp, this company is still actually operating. They have their address, their 9 to 5 hours, and mentioned that they keep the office closed on weekends.
No users have reviewed this business on yelp. No one has claimed their page, so it currently remains “unclaimed.”
In truth, it’s very possible that Yelp automatically generated a page for this company, which is why the information is still available and active. Because of their lack of activity over the last four or five years, it is not possible to determine whether or not the company is in business. They have no website, their phone number doesn’t work, and their social media pages remain inactive for many years. Although, there was never any kind of post saying the company is shut down officially, so it’s actually hard to definitely say that the company is no longer in business, even though it appears to be the case.
Gold Trust Financial Pros
- The company has received excellent reviews on Trustlink. Unfortunately, these reviews are over eight years old, so they are definitely outdated at this point.
Gold Trust Financial Cons
- On the Better Business Bureau website, this company has received 2 complaints that haven’t been resolved and they have made no attempt to resolve them. They also have a D- rating based on their lack of communication and poor performance.
- Previous customers claim that the products they sell are marked up dramatically compared to their actual value.
- It was impossible to figure out who actually ran this company, so they aren’t operating with complete transparency.
- In all likelihood, Gold Trust Financial is actually a defunct company at this point in time.
Bottom Line
At this stage of the game, you are undoubtedly just as puzzled as we are about Gold Trust Financial. Their website is completely defunct and you cannot even visit it anymore, so it’s nearly impossible for someone to purchase precious metals from them.
Is this business still active? Are they working diligently to properly serve their clients? I can honestly say that I do not know because it’s difficult to pinpoint the truth.
The majority of the information that we discovered was based on reviews made externally about the company.
For starters, the company does not have Better Business Bureau accreditation. And this is the truth even though they have 30 years in business. Worst of all, the BBB currently has a D- rating because the company did not address 2 complaints made about them. Both of these complaints were from customers claiming that the company ripped them off and charged much higher prices than they were supposed to.
Between 2013-2015, it seems like the company was in good standing and they were making their customers happy according to reviews on Trustlink. But the company hasn’t received any new reviews in over eight years, so this is old information at best.
Since we had such a difficult time gathering information about this company, it’s impossible to recommend doing business with them even if it’s possible. They would have to rebuild their website and start offering precious metals to the public once again, but I still wouldn’t recommend them because of the allegations and complaints about their pushy sales tactics.
Instead, pick a better company with a solid reputation known for helping customers get set up with a gold IRA quickly and easily.
About Tim Schmidt
Tim Schmidt is an Entrepreneur who has covered retirement investing since 2012. He's also a published author, and his views on investing have been featured in USA Today, Tech Times, The Huffington Post, Nasdaq, and many more.
