Jim Rickards’ Case Against Gold

by Jim Rickards

Jim gives the three main arguments economists make against gold, and why they’re dead wrong:

Jim Rickards’ Case Against Gold

“Istanbul, Turkey – January 10, 2013: Gold bars in a storefront window display at the Grand Bazaar in Istanbul. The bars are minted in Turkey.”

1. ‘Experts’ say there’s not enough gold to support a global financial system. Gold can’t support the world’s paper money, its assets and liabilities, its expanded balance sheets of all the banks and the financial institutions in the world.

2. Gold cannot support the growth of world trade and commerce because it doesn’t grow fast enough. The world’s mining output is about 1.6% of total gold stocks. World growth is roughly 3–4% a year. It varies, but let’s assume 3–4%.

3. Gold has no yield. It’s true, but gold isn’t supposed to have a yield. Gold is money. Pull out a dollar bill, hold it up in front of you and look at it. Does it have a yield? No, of course it has no yield, money has no yield.’

If you want yield, you have to take risk. You can put your money in the bank and get a little bit of yield — maybe half a percent. Probably not even that. But it’s not money anymore. When you put it in the bank, it’s not money. It’s a bank deposit. That’s an unsecured liability in an occasionally insolvent commercial bank.

You can also buy stocks, bonds, real estate, and many other things with your money. But when you do, it’s not money anymore. It’s some other asset, and they involve varying degrees of risk. The point simply is that, if you want yield, you have to take risk. Physical gold doesn’t offer an official yield, but it doesn’t carry risk. It’s simply a way of preserving wealth.

“I believe the primary way every investor should play the rise in gold is to own the physical metal directly. In fact, I always say that at least 10% of your investment portfolio should be devoted to physical gold—bars, coins and the like.”

“But there are good ways to do this. And bad ones.”

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