Why investing in gold is a dumb idea

Gold is a dumb metal who sits there and does nothing. Gold bars don’t have sex and create more gold bars.

Ever since I have been interested in finance, I have met people who predict the end of the monetary system as we know it. In such a horrific scenario, gold would be the only valid currency. I believe, if the world ever came to that scenario, the things of real value would be guns, ammo, canned food, and a fishing pole.

I think investing in gold is a dumb idea for the following reasons:

  1. Gold is a nonproducing asset. It’s not like investing in real estate where you can rent your property, investing in land and cattle where you see your investment grow. It’s not like stocks or bonds where you will get a return for your money. No, gold is just a dumb metal that just sits there and does nothing.
  2. Jan 17. Eating with friends. We wanted to pay with gold coins but the waiter didn’t take it. 🙁

    Most people who invest in gold, they do it through an exchange. If ever, the stock market falls and all the institutions around it, the same thing will happen to gold investments. Gold holdings will evaporate just like all the stocks and bonds. When you invest through an exchange, you are only holding bits and bites on a computer screen. No one is going to come to your house and deliver bars of gold.

  3. By law, Canadians and United Staters  (misspelled on purpose) are not allowed to hold bars of gold. They can only hold gold coins (which are exchanged as collector items at a high premium) or jewelry. If ever there is no rule of law where the whole financial system has failed, there will be no rule of law to protect you from a person who can take it away from you by violence.
  4. Opportunity cost. Many gold bug pundits recommend holding about 5% of your portfolio in gold. If gold is not going to save you from financial Armageddon if you can not convert it into tangible bars of gold, then holding any gold at all, even 1% of it will have an opportunity cost of investing that money into an asset which can provide a real return.
  5. If you hold physical gold, you have to protect it and insure it, this means that your gold will become a recurring expense. After doing your cost analysis, you will be worse off year after year.

We have to have faith in humanity, we have to believe that our social system will protect us from the chaotic scenario where gold could become a real currency. If we continue believing in the rule of law, very few investments can do better than the stock market.

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Comments

3 responses to “Why investing in gold is a dumb idea”

  1. OK, then why do central banks still carry gold then…if they still have any gold left? Why not paper currency, real estate, oil, diamonds?

    1. Hello Charlie,

      The central banks do many things which I don’t understand. So the answer to your question is: I don’t know.

      Most central banks got off the gold standard because they didn’t have enough gold to back up their currency. In 1933 President Roosevelt got the US off the gold standard. Since then the government has been printing more and more money, during the 3 Quantitative Easing, the government printed more than 12 Trillion dollars, and the value of gold has not gone much higher than the rate of inflation. Inflation is less than 2% right now. As an investment gold has not kept up with Treasury Bill, Bonds. or stocks.

      In summary, as in investment it is drastically under performing other assets, as protection against inflation is not keeping up, as protection against Armageddon it will not work as long as it’s part of a electronic exchange. In its physical form it’s a recurring expense (insurance & storage) and the opportunity cost is huge.