There’s gold in bullion adverts for fill-your-boots Farage

Direct Bullion, which encourages savers and investors to buy gold, had been advertising on multiple channels. Indeed, an archived version of its website dating from after the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022 shows it had advertised on TV news network RT, formerly known as Russia Today.

But when GB News was launched in 2021, Withers paid attention.

The former Royal Navy electronic warfare technician said to The Observer: “We were the main headline sponsor when [GB News] first launched, then Nigel joined the news channel, so we sponsored around his show – and that’s when we got the most response. So then we would purposely load up on the adverts.”

Withers sought an introduction and the pair had “good conversations” that led to the offer of a deal.

The £280,000 Farage has been paid by Direct Bullion is his second-highest set of earnings after £402,000 he has earned from his work for GB News. Since last year’s election, Farage has topped the list of high-earning MPs.

The Reform UK leader has filmed several promotional videos for Direct Bullion, which has offices in London, Florida and California, and operates on “slivering margins”, said Withers.

The company’s most recent set of accounts, covering the year to January 2024, shows assets of about £2.6m.

The entries in Farage’s parliamentary register of interests, while clear about the value of the payments from Direct Bullion, are less clear about the work he has done for the company, stating it is for an “estimated maximum” of four hours worked a month.

This lack of clarity raises questions for the Reform leader, say transparency campaigners.

“The public have a right to know how much time parliamentarians spend on second jobs, and how much they’re paid,” said Steve Goodrich, head of research and investigations at Transparency International. “When MPs are vague about the terms of their outside employment, it prevents scrutiny of their finances, including whether these are genuinely commercial engagements or donations by another name.

“Labour has pledged to tighten the rules on moonlighting by MPs, which is often a distraction from their public duties. Until it does, those with second jobs could at least be clear about how much they’re being paid, when and for what work.”

A Labour spokesperson said: “The public deserves to know what [Farage is] really being paid for here.”

Reform did not respond to requests for a comment.

For Withers, the commercial deal has secured him enviable access to a man who many are tipping as a possible prime minister.

It is already not just about money. Withers describes himself as having become a serial entrepreneur since his time in the navy. He joined Reform during last year’s election campaign, has been to “a couple” of Reform events and is planning to attend next month’s party conference in Birmingham, he said. Beyond his £25 membership fee, though, he said he has never donated to or sponsored the party.

“I like Reform because I believe in what Nigel stands for. I worked bloody hard, and see a lot of what I worked hard for go to waste. The majority [of people are] seeing this – it’s nationwide, and when I look at the proper alternatives, there’s nothing there.”

Farage was “a real goldbug”, according to Withers, and their arrangement appears to have served both men well. “Nigel is bringing the customers to us,” said Withers. “It’s done better than I ever anticipated.”

He declined to “get into the financial side” of it – Farage’s register makes clear the scale of his earnings – but said there is a “loose” contract that allows Farage to work, in effect, ad hoc for Direct Bullion.

“We just talk, and as things come up,” Withers said. “It doesn’t require me to get him in the room every month or so, but if there is a new coin from the Royal Mint, I might call him up and say: ‘Can you do us some content on this coin?’ – he would do it.

“He would come in for a couple of hours and put together some content, then we might not see him again for six or seven months. But he always picks up the phone and he is always there to help if I need it.”

It is certainly true that the connection between gold markets and the Reform leader predates his work for Direct Bullion. In 2020, Farage was promoting his daily newsletter Fortune & Freedom, which promised to give readers “the lowdown on why the financial industry doesn’t care about the man on the street” and help “take back control of [your] money”.

Farage has also earned £134,000 from a series of recordings for the video-greeting app Cameo, plus five-figure sums from Elon Musk’s X Corp, Google, the Telegraph group and Rupert Murdoch’s Australian media network News Pty.

Two five-figure sums totalling £60,000 appear from Thailand-based businessman and former supporter of Boris Johnson, Christopher Harborne – although only one of them has made its way on to the Electoral Commission’s parallel database.

Farage has also endorsed a short-lived “community cashback” retailer called UK We Save, recording a video in which he said: “We are facing a cost of living crisis in the United Kingdom and I have decided to do something about it.” Explaining the concept – in which consumers bulk buy nappies to reduce costs – he added: “The more people that join, the cheaper they will be … click that link, it’s free to join. It’s going to save you a lot of money.”

The website has since been taken down but the group’s X page still exists – complete with a picture of the Reform leader as its banner. The parent company, Chaching Ltd, which is run by the business executive Christopher Sugrue, is still active, although its accounts are six months overdue. There is no reference to this work on Farage’s register, and he has previously said it was unpaid.

Alongside its connection to Farage, Direct Bullion has promoted its purported links to a charity, the Ocean Cleanup, saying the company is “committed to doing all we can to help clean up the oceans and seas that we so desperately rely on” and that it would be “independently helping” the project after “extensive research and discussions”.

The company urged customers to round up their orders to “the nearest £1, £10, £100, £1000 or even £1,000,000”, adding that “100% of your donation goes to the Ocean Clean Up” [sic].

However, a spokesperson for the charity said information on the Direct Bullion website contained a number of errors about its work to rid the world’s oceans of plastic “and we have no records of them or DB London Ltd having made any donations to help us achieve our mission”.

After being contacted by The Observer, Direct Bullion removed the charity page from its website. Withers said he had been inspired to back the charity because of his background in the Royal Navy, but had “no takers” from his customers. Withers is now in talks with a “company about trees that I think will be more fitting”.

The relationship with Farage continues, Withers said. “[Nigel] is happy, we’re happy, and his constituents are happy because he has time and money to do what he wants – and he can run Reform while he does it.”

Farage is expected to miss the return to parliament when he flies to Washington DC to speak at the National Conservatism (NatCon) conference in early September. NatCon is organised by the Edmund Burke Foundation, whose UK arm is led by James Orr, the man behind the Reform-backing thinktank and fundraising vehicle Centre for a Better Britain.

Further reading:

• Farage’s £13,000 speech to anti-abortion extremists

Photograph by Carl Court/Getty