The Royal Mint (DigiGold) review

DigiGold is fractional ownership of bars held in The Vault®, the Royal Mint's own high-security facility at Llantrisant in South Wales. You buy in pounds rather than in grams — from £25 upwards — and the Mint quotes a price that already contains its dealing spread, so there is no separate commission line to reconcile.

The same account can hold three different things: digital fractional metal, physical coins and bars stored in The Vault, and items delivered to your door. Moving between them is the feature that distinguishes the Mint from a pure digital venue: a digital gold balance can be converted into deliverable Britannias or Sovereigns once it is large enough, which for a UK taxpayer is a meaningful route because those coins are legal tender and therefore exempt from capital gains tax.

Digital metal storage is 0.5% plus VAT a year, charged quarterly in arrears on the average daily value of the holding. With VAT at 20% the real annual figure is 0.60%, which is roughly five times what an order-board venue charges — the premium you pay for sovereign-grade custody.

Physical items stored in The Vault are dearer still: coin tubes and larger bars at 1% plus VAT, single capsules and small 1g–10g bars at 2% plus VAT. There is no minimum monthly charge, which is the reverse of the trade-off at BullionVault: small savers are treated proportionally here, large holders pay a lot in absolute terms. UK delivery of stored physical items is free, so the exit route does not carry a hidden extraction fee.

Counterparty quality is the strongest argument for this platform. The Royal Mint is owned by HM Treasury, has operated since 886, and stores the metal in a facility it built and controls rather than renting space from a third-party logistics group. Holdings are allocated and title passes to you at purchase.

Bullion investment products themselves are not FCA-regulated — that is true of every operator in this comparison, and it means the Financial Services Compensation Scheme does not apply. What replaces regulatory protection here is the nature of the owner: a government-owned mint with a 1,100-year operating history and no incentive to run an under-collateralised book.

Funding is by debit card or bank transfer in sterling. Selling digital metal back is a single click at the Mint's quoted buy price during UK market hours; settlement returns to your registered bank account. Because everything is sterling-denominated, a euro- or dollar-based buyer takes an FX leg on the way in and again on the way out, which can easily exceed a year of storage fees.

Digital metal cannot itself be withdrawn — you own a fraction of a bar, and fractions do not ship. The conversion route into whole coins or bars is what turns the holding physical, and it requires enough value to buy a complete item.

It suits a UK saver who wants the safest available counterparty, an entry point of £25, and an eventual path into CGT-exempt Britannias or Sovereigns. For a monthly savings habit the absence of a minimum charge makes it materially cheaper than order-board venues at small size.

It suits less well a large long-horizon holder, where 0.6% a year all-in on digital metal costs several times the alternative, and it suits non-UK buyers poorly because of the sterling FX leg.