Regal Assets is one of the best-known gold IRA companies on the market, especially for people interested in cryptocurrency. Their Regal IRA program allows investors to purchase a mix of crypto and precious metals for their wallets. While this approach allows you to invest in multiple alternative assets at once, it does have some risks.
The original idea was that people could create a portfolio based on their risk tolerance. Retirees might want to secure their current holdings in gold to protect against market turbulence. But younger people might want to invest more heavily in crypto, in the hopes that it would grow significantly over time. Younger people tend to have a higher risk tolerance and more incentive toward financial growth.
Regal Assets Services
Precious metals and cryptocurrency are both labeled as "alternative" assets. This means that they can't be held in a traditional IRA, which is managed by an investment manager or other finance professional. If you want to hold these assets in your retirement account, you need a self-directed IRA.
Regal Assets helps people with the application paperwork for a self-directed IRA. Then they help you transfer funds from your current retirement account. Once you've done that, you can buy gold and crypto from the large list of options offered by Regal Assets.
The gold will be stored in a licensed depository, since it's not legal to keep a self-directed IRA at home. The crypto will be kept in a highly secure and encrypted digital wallet. In theory, a representative of Regal Assets will help you figure out which purchases are best for you. They'll explain the different products, how they work, and how popular they are. Then they'll help you balance your portfolio between crypto and gold and silver.
Regal Assets is not the only company to offer these types of services. While they used to be one of the top options on the market, recent reviews indicate that there might be deep issues afoot.
Is Regal Assets a Scam?
In the past, it was clear that Regal Assets wasn't a scam. For the first several years after the company was founded, it was the subject of rave reviews. It was one of the first companies to offer a cryptocurrency IRA service, and customers said that they were very satisfied with their experiences. In fact, there were hardly any complaints, and those that did exist were quickly dealt with.
Unfortunately, that no longer seems to be the case. It appears that Regal Assets has gone through some kind of major change. While there's no concrete evidence that the company is a scam, it does seem to be badly mismanaged. There are multiple serious allegations from past customers, plus government action that's been taken.
Regal Assets failed to file the proper paperwork to sell bullion in Minnesota, even though they had done so for multiple years. This resulted in a judgment of thousands of dollars against them. They never responded to the court or made an attempt to represent themselves, something that could have improved the judgment.
The Better Business Bureau has logged 21 complaints about Regal Assets in the past three years, but 19 of those complaints are from the prior year alone. For some reason, there began to be a massive uptick in complaints over the past year, with serious allegations. The company has failed to offer any explanation or to follow up on the vast majority of complaints, leading to an F rating from the BBB. The customer rating has also tanked over the past year or so.
Customer Complaints
Some of the complaints reference a salesperson being fired for misconduct, but there's very little information available about this. The CEO told these customers about the firing but did not explain the reasons for the termination. In addition, since the salesperson's name is redacted in the public complaints, it's difficult to tell whether the same person was involved in each transaction.
Several customers say that they were personally contacted by the company's CEO, but that he failed to follow up or to help them get their assets back. When the company responds to complaints, there's just one line stating that they'll contact the management. Several customers indicate that they were never contacted after this, and that the business had completely failed to follow up as promised.
An alarming trend in the complaints is the existence of missing funds. Customers say that they gave Regal Assets thousands of dollars to purchase precious metals. But then after weeks or months, the metals hadn't been purchased or shipped. When the customers tried to get a refund or an answer about their purchase, they were unable to. Several were working with their lawyers on bringing legal action against Regal Assets.
Of the 21 complaints on the BBB website, only three have been marked as resolved. One of those three involved a customer that was still disgruntled, stating that Regal Assets had given an incorrect timeline prior to solving the issue. Another complaint was resolved more than a year ago, with the initial complaint posted August 30 of 2021 and the resolution posted September 17 of the same year.
Resolved Issue with Delivery
There has only been one truly resolved complaint from this year, which was filed in April of 2022. The customer said that he and his wife had opened three gold IRAs in December of 2021. They had spent thousands of dollars and were supposed to have the metals split across each account. To date, only a fraction of the items had been sent.
The customer noted that he and his wife had paid more than $700 in commissions, maintenance fees, and storage fees. He said that he had spoken over the phone to the company president and exchanged multiple emails with the company management. On the phone, he was assured multiple times that the metals would be shipped. But his online account still showed that the metals were awaiting delivery.
It had been over four months since opening the accounts, which the customer said should be more than enough time to ship the metals. He just wanted the metals to be delivered without any further hassle. In addition, he noted that the BBB had been able to resolve other delivery delay issues, so he hoped that that would be possible here.
Regal Assets responded in May of 2022 to say that the customer's metals had been shipped to the proper IRAs. They said that the problem was related to an account error, in which account numbers for the orders was crossed.
Four days later, the customer confirmed that the orders had been fulfilled, and that the metals had been delivered to the depository. But he said that he was still frustrated that it had taken five months for the orders to be filled, as well as how persistent he had to be with the BBB to fix things.
Unanswered Ignoring of Sale Request
There are two unanswered complaints on the BBB website, which have earned Regal Assets its current F rating. Several other complaints have been answered poorly, but they at least have been acknowledged by the company.
One unanswered complaint was posted on September 15, 2022. The customer had bought precious metals through Regal Assets more than a year prior. They wanted to have their account liquidated, so in August of 2022, they contacted their representative to ask her to coordinate the sale.
The customer said that it was extremely hard to get the representative on the phone. He had to "phone stalk" her, and he was kept on hold for long periods of time in order to get a response. Three weeks later, when he still hadn't successfully managed his transaction, the company CEO called him.
The CEO told him that the sales representative had been fired, so he would help the customer with the transaction. But when the customer wrote the complaint, it had been weeks without any more contact. The CEO refused to answer their calls or reply to their emails.
The customer said that he was totally dissatisfied. If the problem wasn't fixed in 10 days, he would remove his assets and put them with a different company entirely. When he tried to call Regal Assets the day that he wrote his complaint, the office was closed. So he turned to the BBB instead.
Regal Assets never responded to this complaint. The CEO has not made any effort to explain what went wrong, and he doesn't seem interested in honoring the buyback program.
The customer never followed up with the BBB, but it has been over 10 days since the complaint was posted. He may have chosen to liquidate his assets using a different gold IRA company. Since Regal Assets isn't an account custodian, he would not have needed to change anything about his account maintenance.
Unanswered Lack of Delivery
The other unanswered complaint was filed on August 2, 2022. It is from a customer who says that they never received the metals that they had purchased. This timeline is extremely close to that of the previous complainant, but the issue here wasn't the buyback program, it was the initial order. At least the prior complainant does seem to have received his items.
The customer said that he had used the Regal Assets IRA transfer process to buy some silver and gold for his retirement account in April of 2022. At the time, he was told that the metals would be sent out and arrive at the CNB Custody depository within 8 weeks. As of writing the complaint, it had been 12 weeks since that conversation.
The customer said that his sales representative would not respond to emails or calls. Then he was told that another employee was in charge of the transfer. He had gotten in contact with her and sent her emails. She told him that there was an issue with an account number being mismatched, and that it had been corrected. According to her, the status on the account should change by the following day.
However, the following day came with no change. The customer tried to email and call her on every subsequent day, but he was not given any response. He said that it sounded like what had happened to him was extremely similar to what had happened to other people filing complaints with the BBB. He believed that Regal Assets wasn't trustworthy.
Regal Assets never responded to this complaint, instead treating it like it doesn't exist. The customer has not followed up about whether he was ever able to receive his assets, but the situation doesn't seem promising. It's difficult to determine whether he will be able to recoup his lost funds, or if he will ever receive the goods that he paid for.
Pros & Cons of Regal Assets
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Final Thoughts
Once upon a time, Regal Assets was one of the best gold IRA firms in the entire US. They were extremely highly recommended, especially for people who wanted to combine cryptocurrency and precious metals in their retirement account. Part of the appeal was that they had so many different crypto options to choose from, as well as a robust gold and silver inventory.
But times have changed. Regal Assets is no longer the trustworthy provider that it once was. The company has incurred multiple government actions and customer complaints without resolving either. In fact, they have gone from a B- to an F rating with the BBB because of how badly they've handled their complaints.
And the complaints also aren't about arbitrary issues like strict policies or rude representatives. Many of them are about customers wanting their money back when their purchases aren't shipped. Regal Assets has kept their funds without sticking to the terms of the contract. While there don't appear to be any major lawsuits yet, if the company doesn't change its practices soon, then it's only a matter of time before legal action occurs.
It's disappointing to witness this fall from grace. We can't recommend that anyone work with Regal Assets. Instead, we recommend working with another top gold company on the market like Goldco.