FTFM There are many reasons why sensible columnists prefer to steer clear of writing about gold. One is that you get the weirdest responses. Twenty years ago they would arrive in funny shaped envelopes, often in green ink, often from individuals with extraordinarily peculiar views about the world. These days the risk is that anything you say will be instantly picked up, recycled and commented on in a thousand online blogs. Not all of that community are interested in constructive dialogue. Gold retains its capacity to excite the most extreme polarised views.
A second reason for thinking better of writing about gold is the Warren Buffett problem. When asked for his views about gold, he typically replies with the answer, along the lines that gold has never been a good store of value and is unlikely ever to interest him as a home for his money. Gold, he says, “gets dug out of the ground in Africa or some place. Then we melt it down, dig another hole, transport it halfway round the world, then bury it again and pay people to stand around guarding it”. It has, he argues, “no utility”. There will always be other things that he would rather own.
