Gold IRA Research and Data

This section is for readers who want evidence, not opinion. Our Gold IRA guide explains the rules. These reports look at what companies and agencies actually publish, and show the counting behind every statement.

What reports are published?

We list a report here only after it has been checked. If we cannot build a study properly from data we collected and can show the method for, we do not publish it.

What did our first report find?

Our fee disclosure report counts what 16 reviewed companies publish on their own websites. It found that 6 of the 16 put dollar amounts for IRA account or storage fees on their current pages, and that 4 of those 6 give figures that differ between their own pages. Eleven name at least one custodian, 14 name a depository, and 3 publish a markup or spread range.

These counts describe only the 16 companies we reviewed. They are not industry percentages. For example, 6 of 16 is 37.5% of our reviewed set. It says nothing about the share of all Gold IRA companies. The report also counts disclosure, not price: a company can publish a fee schedule and still charge more than one that does not.

What public data sits behind our other pages?

Some pages on this site are built around dated figures from agencies. The table shows where each one comes from and when we last checked it. Open the page for the sources and method.

One example of the kind of figure we cite: the FTC's October 19, 2026 report says "Reported losses from people 60 and older totaled over $3 billion, up from about $2.4 billion in 2024." The same report says "the vast majority of frauds are not reported to the government," so these numbers "likely include only a fraction of older adults harmed by fraud," according to the FTC report. A reported figure is a floor, not a full count.

The same report gives the size of the sample behind that figure. About 469,597 of the reports that included age information came from people 60 and older, and about 123,000 of those reports said money was lost. We quote these counts as the FTC states them; they are reports, not a count of all victims.

Where can you look up public records yourself?

You do not have to rely on any website, including ours. These agency tools are free, and each has limits you should know before you search.

A search that finds nothing is not proof a company is clean. It may only mean nothing was reported to that agency. On October 29, 2026 we re-opened the FTC, FINRA and CFTC pages above. We did not re-open the CFPB, SEC Action Lookup, Augusta and Priority Gold pages that day, so statements about them rest on our October 17 and 22 checks. Our guide to how to verify a dealer walks through these checks step by step.

Which reports are not published yet?

A planned report on dealer premiums is not live. When we tried to collect dealer prices on October 17, 2026, most product pages we looked at showed "call for price" or quote-only wording, or showed no time stamp on the metal price. Without comparable, dated prices from the same hour on the same basis, a premium comparison would be misleading, so we published nothing. We will add it only if we can collect data we can show the method for.

How do we do research?

Every report follows the same short rules.

1. Stated scope. We say exactly what was counted and what was left out.
2. Pages we opened. Company statements come from the company's own pages, such as the Augusta FAQ or a dealer's fee article like Priority Gold's. We label them as company claims, not independent facts.
3. Dates. Each source carries the date we opened it. Websites change, so the date matters.
4. Method and limits. Each report has a method section and a limits section. Counts describe the companies we reviewed, not the whole market.
5. No rankings. We do not rank, score or name a winner, and we do not make price predictions.
6. Independent check. A separate reviewer opens the cited pages and rechecks the numbers before a report goes live; a fix made after that check is not always checked a second time.

Where else can you look?

Use our calculators and tools to run your own numbers, and our regulatory and tax updates for dated changes from the IRS and other agencies. Each report shows the dates we checked its sources. Our corrections policy explains how to report an error.