What 24K gold is worth and how dealers price it
24K is not an alloy at all: it is fine gold of at least 99.9% purity. That makes it the only karat whose scrap value is essentially the full spot price, but it also makes it very soft — too soft to hold a stone setting securely, which is why gem-set rings are almost never made in 24K.
Look for the hallmark 999 or 24K. 24K is typical of investment bars, bullion coins and Asian and Middle-Eastern jewellery. Pure gold scratches and bends easily, so 24K bangles and chains often show dents and wear. Damage does not reduce melt value, but bars and coins in original packaging from a recognised refiner can sell above melt as bullion rather than scrap.
Dealers weigh the piece, deduct stones and non-gold parts, and multiply the net weight by 0.999 to get the fine gold content. They then multiply by the HUF spot price per gram and apply their payout percentage — usually 60–75% of melt at shops and pawnbrokers, 80–90% at specialist buyers.
Worked example: a 5 g small investment bar holds 5.00 g of fine gold. Enter 5 g and 24K in the calculator above to see its live melt value in HUF. Because there is no alloy to deduct, the gap between a fair and an unfair offer on 24K is easy to spot: anything below about 95% of spot for a bar is a poor price.
Hungarian gold usually carries 585 or 750 marks, and buyers are concentrated in Budapest. Because the forint is volatile against the euro, HUF gold prices can move even when the euro price is steady.
Developers can pull the same figure programmatically: 24K gold price per gram API.