The gold melt calculator works out possession value, bid price and ask price from market price, spread, weight of gold and karat. Enter what you have and the relationship is applied straight away, so you get the answer without working through the algebra yourself.
What Is the Gold Melt Calculator?
The gold melt calculator takes market price, spread, weight of gold and karat and turns them into possession value, bid price and ask price.
It is the kind of calculation you would otherwise do on the back of an envelope: mechanical, repeatable and easy to get subtly wrong without noticing.
How the Gold Melt Figure Is Built
Each result is calculated from the ones before it, so the working is fully visible. That matters when the answer is going to be quoted to somebody else and you need to be able to explain where it came from.
The figures are exactly as good as the assumptions underneath them. Check the rates, the periods and the tax treatment before you rely on the result.
Reading the Result Sensibly
A small change in an input can move the result by much more than you would expect, particularly where the calculation divides by one of the figures you supplied. That is worth understanding before you rely on a figure.
For anything that will be committed to, write the inputs down beside the result. A number you can reproduce is worth far more than one you cannot explain.
A Worked Example
Working through an example, with market price set to 10, spread set to 5, weight of gold set to 2, the calculator returns purity of 99.9, and possession value of 19.98, and bid price of 18.98. Substitute your own figures and the same steps produce the same kind of answer.
Frequently Asked Questions
What do I need to work out possession value?
Enter market price, spread, weight of gold and karat. The calculator then works through the relationship and reports possession value, bid price and ask price.
What does the gold melt actually calculate?
It takes market price, spread, weight of gold and karat and converts them into possession value, bid price and ask price using the standard relationship for this problem. Each step is applied in turn, so every output is traceable back to the numbers you typed in.
How should I enter market price?
Use the value you actually have, in the unit shown next to the field. Enter every value in the same unit system. The calculator assumes the figures you supply are consistent, so it cannot correct a mistake that happens before the calculation starts.
Is the answer exact?
It is as exact as the formula and the inputs allow. The method itself is the standard one for this problem, so the only sources of error are the figures you enter and the precision you ask for.
Do I have to fill in every field?
Only the fields a particular result depends on. If you leave one blank, the results that need it simply show a note instead of a number, and everything else still works.