I was recently talking to a friend of mine who considers himself a gold bear, somewhat of a rarity amongst my contemporaries. He believes gold prices are in a bubble and they will come crashing down, causing a lot of people to lose their wealth. He also added: “It’s just a metal, and no one can really use it.” You know my take on gold; I think exactly the opposite. Gold has a history of being money—it has been a store of value and a unit of transfer for longer than the fiat currency created by central banks. Sadly, my friend listens to the mainstream gurus who only speak one side of the story. Since the financial collapse in 2008, gold has become the only savior. Sure, the stock market has increased since 2009, but ask those people who bought in before the market collapsed and never sold about the stock market. I am sure they will disagree with the claim. The Dow Jones Industrial Average and other key indices are still trading below where they were before the financial collapse started. Yes, gold is gaining a lot of attention, but it is nowhere close to being considered as being in bubble status. A commodity, stock, or anything is usually in a bubble when the vast majority of people you speak to are in the game. Think about the tech bubble of the late 1990s or the real estate bubble of 2005–2006. Right now, few people are talking about gold as an investment; and if they are, I hear more people talking about being against gold than about buying it. To me, gold still provides safety against uncertainty. For example, gold prices jumped in price when the Pentagon announced that Iran tried to shoot down a U.S. unarmed and unnamed surveillance drone on November 1. Similarly, there is growing demand for the yellow metal. According to Thomson Reuters GFMS, China ’s demand for gold will exceed the demand for gold by India for the first time. The Chinese demand for gold will reach 869 tonnes in 2012, and it will be in both jewelry and investment. (Source: Reuters, November 8, 2012.) In addition to all that, central banks are continuously printing their respective currencies. From 2008 to 2011 alone, the Federal Reserve has printed $2.3 trillion. Other central banks are doing the same. The Bank of Japan increased its asset purchase program. The European Central Bank (ECB) has decided it will continue to buy an unlimited amount of debt from suffering nations, and the Chinese central bank has been continuously taking measures to turn its slowing economy around. (Source: Bloomberg, November 9, 2012.) So, my friend ... Read More