Silver is more than just Gold's "little brother." It is an essential industrial metal and a proven store of purchasing power. However, anyone wishing to buy physical silver in Europe often faces a frustrating obstacle: Value Added Tax (VAT). While gold can often be purchased tax-free under certain conditions, most governments apply the full VAT rate (e.g., 19% in Germany) to silver bars and coins. This means the silver price must rise by 19% just for you to break even.
But there is a legal and clever way to bypass this hurdle. In this article, we will show you how to buy silver without VAT and why a so-called bonded warehouse is the key to maximizing your returns.
In many jurisdictions, specific tax rules that once made silver coins attractive (like differential taxation) have been tightened or abolished. The result: When you buy from a local dealer, you pay the net price plus the statutory VAT.
The Problem: If you invest €1,000 in silver, €190 of that amount goes directly to the tax authorities (assuming 19% VAT). You are effectively only receiving €810 worth of silver.
How do professional investors solve this? The answer lies in storage location. VAT generally only applies when silver is physically imported into the economic territory (e.g., the EU) and delivered to the customer. However, if you buy the silver and have it stored in a duty-free warehouse (bonded warehouse), no import takes place for tax purposes.
A bonded warehouse is a government-monitored storage facility that, while geographically located within a country, is considered "foreign territory" for customs and tax purposes (transit zone). As long as your precious metals remain stored there, no customs duties or import VAT apply.
This is not a loophole; it is a completely legal practice in international trade. For you as an investor, this means: Buy VAT-free silver: Bars and coins at the net price.
Let’s calculate this with a concrete example to highlight the massive advantage. We assume a fictional silver price (including dealer premium) of €1,000 per kilogram (Net).
You pay €1,190 but only own 1 kg of silver.
You immediately save €190.
If you invest the saved money (€190) directly into silver as well, you receive—at a fictional price of approx. €1 per gram—almost 190 grams of additional silver. Instead of 1,000 grams, you own nearly 1,200 grams of silver for the same total investment. That is an immediate 19% return advantage compared to home delivery.
It is important to understand that this is tax deferral. If you decide to have your silver physically delivered from the bonded warehouse to your home, the goods cross the customs border. At that moment, the import VAT (e.g., 19%) would become due.
However: Most investors use silver in bonded warehouses purely for investment purposes. If you sell the silver later (within the warehouse system), no VAT applies to the transaction. Furthermore, in countries like Germany, capital gains from the sale of physical silver are completely tax-free after a holding period of one year, provided it is physically allocated property.
You might be thinking: "A bonded warehouse is only for millionaires." That used to be true. This is where Spargold comes in.
At Spargold, we have dismantled the barriers to professional high-security storage. When you buy silver via the Spargold app, it is not stored in just any warehouse, but in "The Reserve" at one of the safest and most renowned locations for precious metals in the world: Singapore.
Singapore is considered the "Fort Knox of Asia." The city-state is politically extremely stable and has legislation that specifically protects and encourages investments in precious metals (Investment Precious Metals - IPM Status). Singapore is also the most militarized country in Southeast Asia and one of the most heavily militarized in the world.
Take advantage of benefits previously reserved for major banks. Invest smartly, legally avoid the tax burden, and build wealth in real assets with Spargold.
Stay farsighted
Yours, Nils Gregersen
