Gold: Past, Present, and Future

Paul Peterson4 said:Basically, we’re looking at a massive red flag here—the actual amount of money backed by real-world value is shrinking compared to this mountain of speculative cash, interest on top of interest, and those general paper bubbles that have absolutely zero foundation in reality.
When you look at where the West is dumping its resources lately—dealing with scams like Meta or basically sawing off the very branch they're sitting on—it’s pretty hard to see any kind of bright future in this mess.
But regarding PM, the real question I'm asking is: who actually wins and who loses when we introduce PM as the new backing for currency? It’s obvious the collectors win, but let’s be real, the collectors aren't the ones calling the shots. The people making the decisions are the ones running the political show right now. They love the current fiat setup; all they need is a minor "adjustment" to win back some semblance of trust.
Or maybe it'll be one big theatrical production. Are we going to go to war, say against Iran? But honestly, we already sold that script in Iraq and Afghanistan, and it didn't do much for anyone except line the pockets of a few people with massive profits.

At the end of the day, today's currencies—regardless of whether you're looking at M1, M2, or any other metric—possess zero intrinsic value and zero backing.

brightviper48 said:And what, exactly, is the actual utility of gold? What can one truly accomplish with it? You cannot eat it—certainly not—you cannot use it to warm your home, you cannot grow crops upon it, nor can you live inside it... it serves no practical purpose in any meaningful sense.

Gold, much like any other currency, possesses value only insofar as the rest of society agrees that it does...

Beyond that, it simply fails to generate any tangible value—on a farm, you can plant crops to sell; in the woods, you can harvest timber for profit; but with gold, you’re left doing nothing but waiting for some sucker willing to pay an even higher price...

It sounds like you don't quite grasp the fundamental nature of money. 🤷
Gold and silver function as money because of their inherent physical properties—traits no other commodity possesses—not simply because of a collective whim. Humanity has understood this logic for thousands of years, yet it only took a single stroke of Nixon's pen to make us forget such a straightforward, logical truth.
Fiat currencies rely entirely on the leap of faith required to believe that a scrap of paper and some ink is worth, say, a printed $100 bill, when in reality, it's barely worth a fraction of a cent.

brightviper48 said:And what, exactly, is the actual utility of gold? What can one truly accomplish with it? You cannot eat it—certainly not—you cannot use it to warm your home, you cannot grow crops upon it, nor can you live inside it... it serves no practical purpose in any meaningful sense.

Gold, much like any other currency, possesses value only insofar as the rest of society agrees that it does...

Beyond that, it simply fails to generate any tangible value—on a farm, you can plant crops to sell; in the woods, you can harvest timber for profit; but with gold, you’re left doing nothing but waiting for some sucker willing to pay an even higher price...

Forex doesn't create any value either.
The colleague explained it perfectly... maybe learn what money actually is before jumping into a debate. 🙂

brightviper48 said:And what, exactly, is the actual utility of gold? What can one truly accomplish with it? You cannot eat it—certainly not—you cannot use it to warm your home, you cannot grow crops upon it, nor can you live inside it... it serves no practical purpose in any meaningful sense.

Gold, much like any other currency, possesses value only insofar as the rest of society agrees that it does...

Beyond that, it simply fails to generate any tangible value—on a farm, you can plant crops to sell; in the woods, you can harvest timber for profit; but with gold, you’re left doing nothing but waiting for some sucker willing to pay an even higher price...

Well, you can plate contacts in consumer electronics to boost conductivity,
or use it as a protective layer for silver traces in high-end defense tech,
not to mention its role in insulating components for certain "specialized" aerospace projects.
Then there's the option of wearing it just to look good and feel important... 😍

Gold allows you to acquire silver at an incredibly favorable ratio—and once you have that silver, the possibilities are endless.😂😂😂

brightviper48 said:And what, exactly, is the actual utility of gold? What can one truly accomplish with it? You cannot eat it—certainly not—you cannot use it to warm your home, you cannot grow crops upon it, nor can you live inside it... it serves no practical purpose in any meaningful sense.

Gold, much like any other currency, possesses value only insofar as the rest of society agrees that it does...

Beyond that, it simply fails to generate any tangible value—on a farm, you can plant crops to sell; in the woods, you can harvest timber for profit; but with gold, you’re left doing nothing but waiting for some sucker willing to pay an even higher price...

Look, I get it—you can't eat gold. But would you seriously try? 😕 Like, are you planning on having Swiss chard with a side of a hundred-dollar bill $33 for dinner every night? Or maybe just a little sandwich made out of some Intel shares? Or better yet, are you going to toss that cash into the wood stove to keep the house warm?

The cartel just dumped everything into the 6th—gold dropped $20 in five minutes flat, and silver took a hit of over 2%. Honestly, I’m dying to know... what kind of news could possibly be that bearish for gold?

placidlynx43 said:The cartel just dumped everything into the 6th—gold dropped $20 in five minutes flat, and silver took a hit of over 2%. Honestly, I’m dying to know... what kind of news could possibly be that bearish for gold?

Check this out:

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-0...ce-report.html

Melissa Sanchez17 said:Check this out:

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-0...ce-report.html

Total nonsense. This has zero connection to what's actually happening on the ground:
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/march-...-quadruple-dip

So, I was thinking about something; I actually asked a similar question a few months back but didn't quite get the clarity I was looking for, so maybe I just phrased it poorly the first time.

How much does all this recent news regarding the Eurozone actually impact gold prices? For instance, if we follow the logic that a weaker Euro means a stronger Dollar, then it feels like gold might not see much upward movement regardless of how things play out in Europe. If some Eurozone member faces a crisis and goes bust, the Dollar likely climbs—right?—and if things eventually stabilize and we dodge a recession, gold might dip again. Am I missing something there?

It seems like the real core of the issue is really just the strength of the Dollar itself, along with the Fed's quantitative easing and all that jazz.

That brings me to the part that’s been really tripping me up lately: since gold is priced in Dollars, if Europe hits a wall and the Dollar surges because of it, gold price stays flat even though everything else is falling apart.🤷

I know I've probably rambled on a bit here, but that's the specific loop I'm stuck in... so if anyone could help break this down for me, I'd really appreciate it!

Frank Walker7 said:So, I was thinking about something; I actually asked a similar question a few months back but didn't quite get the clarity I was looking for, so maybe I just phrased it poorly the first time.

How much does all this recent news regarding the Eurozone actually impact gold prices? For instance, if we follow the logic that a weaker Euro means a stronger Dollar, then it feels like gold might not see much upward movement regardless of how things play out in Europe. If some Eurozone member faces a crisis and goes bust, the Dollar likely climbs—right?—and if things eventually stabilize and we dodge a recession, gold might dip again. Am I missing something there?

It seems like the real core of the issue is really just the strength of the Dollar itself, along with the Fed's quantitative easing and all that jazz.

That brings me to the part that’s been really tripping me up lately: since gold is priced in Dollars, if Europe hits a wall and the Dollar surges because of it, gold price stays flat even though everything else is falling apart.🤷

I know I've probably rambled on a bit here, but that's the specific loop I'm stuck in... so if anyone could help break this down for me, I'd really appreciate it!

First, let’s settle the Euro issue—the USDUSD exchange rate is merely the coefficient used to
convert the global, Dollar-denominated price of gold into a European price when you're buying it
in Europe, much like how everything would be multiplied by the USDUSD rate if you were buying in the US. 😉
The Dollar's advantage lies in its status as the world's reserve currency, which is why the global price of gold is denominated in Dollars. Think of the gold price as a gauge for the rot within the Dollar; the price is manipulated specifically to keep the Dollar on life support, because the securities market allows for that kind of maneuvering.
If they weren't manipulating it, the gold price in Dollars would be climbing, and since the Euro is weakening,
the price in Euros would be climbing even faster.
Last year, we saw the opposite: the Dollar price went up, but the Euro was also strengthening, so the percentage increase of gold in Euros was actually less than the increase in Dollars.

Walter Barrett8 said:First, let’s settle the Euro issue—the USDUSD exchange rate is merely the coefficient used to
convert the global, Dollar-denominated price of gold into a European price when you're buying it
in Europe, much like how everything would be multiplied by the USDUSD rate if you were buying in the US. 😉
The Dollar's advantage lies in its status as the world's reserve currency, which is why the global price of gold is denominated in Dollars. Think of the gold price as a gauge for the rot within the Dollar; the price is manipulated specifically to keep the Dollar on life support, because the securities market allows for that kind of maneuvering.
If they weren't manipulating it, the gold price in Dollars would be climbing, and since the Euro is weakening,
the price in Euros would be climbing even faster.
Last year, we saw the opposite: the Dollar price went up, but the Euro was also strengthening, so the percentage increase of gold in Euros was actually less than the increase in Dollars.

Wait, what?
Aren't gold prices actually the same all over the world when you look at them in dollars?

Frank Walker7 said:Wait, what?
Aren't gold prices actually the same all over the world when you look at them in dollars?

If you're looking at it through the lens of the dollar—sure, it’s the same. But don't expect to walk into a jewelry shop in Europe and pay with a stack of greenbacks.
The sticker prices you see in those shops are inevitably
adjusted for the EUR/USD exchange rate, meaning everything is priced in Euros...

I’d say it’s a coin flip whether we see another quick dip below 1526—though I doubt we’ll break 1490. As for miners, that's a different story; I don't see them dropping below the 16.05 level anytime soon.

quiettrucker12 said:I’d say it’s a coin flip whether we see another quick dip below 1526—though I doubt we’ll break 1490. As for miners, that's a different story; I don't see them dropping below the 16.05 level anytime soon.

Everything is going south today, period.🙂

Walter Barrett8 said:If you're looking at it through the lens of the dollar—sure, it’s the same. But don't expect to walk into a jewelry shop in Europe and pay with a stack of greenbacks.
The sticker prices you see in those shops are inevitably
adjusted for the EUR/USD exchange rate, meaning everything is priced in Euros...

I'm still feeling a little lost here....

I mean, what difference do prices in America, China, or even on Mars make to me if the gold I'm buying is priced according to European standards?

So, is the logic really that things are worse for Europe simply because the exchange rate makes the local price of gold look higher?

Anybody.....

Of course gold prices aren't the same everywhere.
That’s the fundamental misunderstanding shared by almost everyone—they fail to see that gold remains constant, while the price per ounce or gram is what actually fluctuates.
If you look back over the last decade, every single currency has lost ground against gold; some more than others, sure, but they're all steadily drifting toward zero.

Hey Anthony Evans78, I totally get where you're coming from—gold is a finite resource, whereas they can just print more paper money and slap a million-dollar price tag on it, and suddenly it's worth a million dollars.

I've been keeping a close eye on everything happening within the Eurozone lately, and it seems like gold is mostly just idling, though I'm sure there are a hundred hidden reasons behind that stagnation.
I’m having a hard time figuring out which specific scenario involving this Euro crisis might actually trigger a rally for gold; maybe I'm just looking at this too narrowly, but...

If I recall correctly, the last massive surge happened back in August 2011 during that whole mess with the US credit rating downgrade.(I remember being as happy as a kid back then; I had just gotten back from a trip to Chicago and picked up 50 grams, only to hop online and see the world was basically falling apart, thinking to myself that prices were about to skyrocket).

So, it feels to me—though I could be wrong—that we're basically just sitting around waiting for some bad news to break out of the States before we see those prices climb again.

Any situation mirroring what we're seeing today is a win for gold. That is, if you actually view it as a store of value and the ultimate currency—one that doesn't answer to some government or central bank.
It's always a smart move to hold precious metals, especially now with the dollar teetering on the edge of instability.
Don't sweat the daily price fluctuations; what matters is how many ounces you actually own.🙂

They’re going to lure everyone out of dollars and into euros, just so they can pull the trigger on Quantitative Easing later. It’s a calculated move—they know the spread on swapping those euros back into dollars is going to sting, and then there's the cost of converting back again. For them, playing the Foreign Exchange market is cheap, easy, and predictable. It’s just another way to make sure the sheep get sheared once more. 😠

Maybe things will finally start making sense to some people...
http://www.mining.com/wp-content/upl...ic2_part_1.jpg