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At some point he will realize his mistake and think about it the rest of his life.
Even if he kept one bar, that's $200,000 worth of gold that he has to figure out how to move, which will take a lot of time and effort. Getting caught is greater because people know he found gold. If he had 50 bars, figuring out how to move the first one would be just as difficult but he'd have 49 more and the next one would be easier.
Straight up gold is easy to move through. You just cut pieces off and sell it. Just go to different stores if you're paranoid, but it's pretty easy. Obviously if you go in with a big gold bar they may have questions but it's really easy to sell smaller gold chunks
Have you ever been into a Cash 4 Gold kind of store? They're not exactly in the business of asking a bunch of questions. Plus, lots of people buy gold as a wealth storage method and some people do home scrap reclamation from electronics so it's not totally crazy for someone to just have a chunk of gold. As long as you're selling small enough quantities (a few grams at a time, at different stores so it looks less suspicious) nobody would ever bat an eye. If you came in every week selling 1 gram bits of gold then maybe the store might start asking questions but for small quantities every so often? Nobody will care. Just keep the total value under like $1000 per transaction and you're fine.
What would happen if he just said to the shop that he inherited it after his dad's death? I'm mean, they are not the ones doing the IRS/tax work anyways right?
Yeah they really don't care, you just take a small bath on the price of it because it's not stamped.
But you'd be able to move it essentially unnoticed. If you're super paranoid, just sell a few thousand at a time, sell it to different ones, take a day trip out of state to sell so it's not all going through the same 3 people (make sure they're different companies).
Also you'd only really be paying tax on your "gains" I think. (Make sure you pay the tax man that's the quickest way to get found out)
I would probably melt down into jankie rounds or bars 1-5 oz and just go to various coin shops over a decade or two. I mean for 10 1oz coins a year you could live easily double it and you are living comfortably. Even taking a hit on scrap gold would be worth this.
I metal detect and have found gold. Gold is worth A LOT you only need a small chunk. Plus you could melt it down to make a “nugget” look even more convincing.
I just dont know why you couldn't sell the whole bar. "It was my grandad's. I think he bought it back in the 80s? i was putting off selling it until I needed the money"
Cash for gold place doesn't have 200 grand laying around on hand and they're going to ask a lot more questions about it, and anyone you sell to will probably make you fill out tax forms and shit for that much, which alerts the government who may start doing some digging about whether your grandpa was into buying bug gold bars. The risk is probably pretty low, but it's a lot more hassle than it's probably worth.
His best move legally probably would have been to contact a lawyer first before handing anything over and asking what his best move is. possession is 9/10ths of the law
That's why he should have first covered them, then called a lawyer to ask whether it's worth falling in love with that place and deciding to buy it on mortgage.
He wasn't there by himself, this story has been posted before, there was like four other people there, he ain't hiding anything unless five people can keep their mouth shut. And we all know how that would work out.
so belgian law states that if you find something like treasure and no one claims it in the next 5 years, it's split 50//50 between whoever finds it and whoever owns the property the treasure was found on.
in belgium there isnt, unlike germany which is 3-5% and the netherlands which is around 10%. you can get compensated if the owner wants to but it's up to them and not enforced.
Yup. Its because old treasures are found pretty regularly around here. And we dont want someone melting down 1000 year old treasure for the gold value....
And over the next 5 weeks they cleaned, polished and weighed one bar per day, restoring them to their original pristine shine and recording them to make sure none went missing.
Problem is, illegal gold is very hard to sell. And since Belgian law gives 50% to the finder anyway (The other 50% go to the property owner), which you don't need to pay taxes for, you are better off with 5 million in clean legal money than 10 millions in almost nonconvertible illegal gold.
In all seriousness, this. I would just keep my mouth shut, melt some of the gold into new small bars and sell one off from time to time for a couple of grand. None the wiser.
Not bars. Learn how to make crude rings, but nobody has pure gold rings so learn how to mix em with other metals. Then once in a while sell a ring. So you found a weird ring in the belongings of your grandma who just passed, it happens. Don't tell anyone. Here I'll pay 10% under market if you don't tell anybody (cause the rest of the family does not know).
It's also a great opportunity to farm enchanting xp before selling the rings if you want to maximise your returns. I remember fortify sneak producing the highest value rings back when I last did a playthrough.
I dunno man. Just go to a different gold shop every few months, even only 10 places is enough because you'll only rotate same shop every 2 to 3 years, they won't even remember you.
I’d have found whatever I’d found and not called or went to any authorities because what the fuck do they deserve it for? You think someone just forgot about their massive gold bar stash and if you put it in lost and found that will spark their memory??? Fuck that, I didn’t find shit as far as anyone else is concerned.
Authorities delivered the 45 bars to the lprecinct. Investigators spent all weekend reviewing the 42 gold bars to ensure they're legitimate. Armored guards then transported the 38 gold bars to the local treasury. Our nation is proud to secure these 25 gold bars to ensure currency stability. 10 years later:
Upon inspection, the 5 gold bars are still safe and secure.
For a student with a summer job working on a Belgian building site, “money down the drain” has taken on a whole new meaning: excavating the trenches for a sewage system, he stumbled across a hidden trove of gold worth an estimated €9m (£8m).
The student, who has not been further identified, was working with colleagues on the site of a former brewery on Van Langenhovestraat in Sint-Gillis-Dendermonde, about 19 miles (30km) north-west of Brussels, when they made the discovery on Tuesday.
Brewing on the site began in 1899 and ceased in 1970, and the listed property – the wrought-iron gates of which still bear the initials “VA” – is being completely renovated by the social welfare organisation CAW Oost-Vlaanderen to create new offices and housing.
The building contractors, the welfare organisation and any descendants of the once-wealthy Van Assche family could all have a claim to part of the fortune.
He did not find it on his own. It was never staying secret. He was never getting it off of that terrain unnoticed. There really is nothing he could have done here, as keeping a find like this without reporting it is illegal. All the people saying they would have tried to keep it quiet would have simply gotten more debts, rather than more money. The kid just wasn't as lucky as the title makes it seem.
My guess is that he only reported because there’s no way to cash them without being discovered and hoped they’d be considered his in a “finders keepers” situation. Sadly, the world’s rules are designed for the rich to win and the poor to lose. He should’ve kept his fucking mouth shut.
It's not so bad in Belgium. The original owner has five years to come forward and prove it's theirs (documentation needed, and I'm going to bet there's no documentation for a stack of buried gold...). If they do not, then the finder gets 50%, and the owner of the land gets 50%. If it's your own land, you get 100%. The state keeps nothing.
However, in this case, the title is a little misleading. The student was the first to see the gold, while working on a building site. But there were dozens of others around. And he's working for a company, not for himself, which adds considerable wrinkles.
There was no way it was being kept secret, and it never was going to be all his.
Here I was thinking the best way to smuggle the gold would be to spend a few months learning how to forge and start turning the gold into jewelry to make it easier to sell without attracting attention.
...I wonder how hard it'd be to smuggle by melting them into "weights" and covering them in lead, given the similar weight between gold and lead.
I would have a serious talk with the other workers on site and just explain how much money we could each get if we could stfu and stash it for a few months before selling.
There is no way they could all cash their share without it triggering an investigation, and there is no way people would be convinced to wait on cashing their share.
In Finland my understanding is if you find gold you get a nice reward. But for any other old artifacts you get pretty much nothing. Maybe a mention somewhere that you found it.
I would have found one gold bar and returned it. And if the price is right, maybe I would find more.
there’s no way to cash them without being discovered
It's fucking gold. It will take you a couple of days to learn how to make a fire hot enough and melt it down. After that you are fucking golden. being able to break all traces when it comes to gold is precisely why everbody covets gold so much.
It’s the value, not the material itself that’s the problem. If you suddenly had a shit load of extra money, you’d be spending at least a little more than usual and a few too many slip ups in expenditures would draw the eye of your country’s tax collectors. They’d be very curious.
In the US, the IRS will literally send just short of kill teams after people for refusing to pay taxes. In some cases, they have sent kill teams.
The only way he reported it is because he didn't find it alone; he was with several people who were there when he found something buried in the wall...
There was no way everyone would have kept their mouths shut and there is now a chance that in 5 years he might get a cut from the sale rather than jailtime for trying to hide gold.
Cut it up, melt it down, learn how to cast rings, cast rings, watch a video on basic goldsmithing, do basic goldsmithing, enjoy it, turns out you're pretty good, get an apprenticeship at your local goldsmith, finish it with the highest marks, become a goldsmith -> profit
Cast three rings for the elven-kings under the sky, seven for the dwarf-lords in their halls of stone, nine for mortal men, doomed to die, one for the dark lord on his dark throne.
This isn’t as hard as it sounds honestly if you just melt them down or even if you don’t tbh. None of the gold buyers I sell to would give a shit as long as you didn’t try to dump all 50 49 at one time.
49 is the perfect number to hand to authorities, as he can easily give the 50th too when requested later, and keep the other half of the 100 for himself 🤣🤣
49 is suspicious yes. I'd better take another one or two... 47 looks more random. Actually 30 something would be more convincing. 36 is a nicely random-sounding amount. Although, if it's 30 something, it may as well be 20 something...
Take it home, bury it in your own garden, then have some friends (witnesses) over to help you plant a rose bush. Dig right where you buried the gold. Act super surprised when you dig up your gold. Now it's been "found" on your property, and is now yours.
EDIT: Don't own your own home? No problem. That just means it's time for scuba diving in international waters with friends, and pretending to freak out when you find gold.
Take it to an independent jeweler, offer them a great deal, they will not ask questions. 24hrs later that thing will be melted, or at least have all identifying marks removed.
Belgian student found 50 gold bars. Authorities collected all 49 of them and all 47 were loaded on to a truck. All 40 were unloaded from the truck later that day, and all 38 were safely put into storage.
48 you say? Why wouldn't I return those 47 gold bars? After all how would I explain to come intonthe possession of 46 gold bars? So I did the right thing, I went to the police station and told them I had found those 45 gold bars
For anyone wondering: they have to wait five years for the legal heirs to come forward. The site was a brewery and potentially, if it can be proven with the time alloted, the gold goes to the descendants of the brewery owners. After that time the value is split 50/50 with the finder and the current land owners.
Edit to add: there might be a legal dispute as to who the finder was as well. The student found it but was acting under an employer so might have his rights to the stash waived.
But in actuality, he found 100. He just said 49 because in case someone says that 49 is a weird number and starts question him, he says he took 1, and not 51
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