<p>Gold closed July 2026 at $4,043 an ounce. It gained roughly 48% in 2025, its strongest year in more than four decades.</p>
<p>In contrast, the S&P 500 has traded mostly sideways since January. This difference in trading performance has pushed the age-old gold vs. stock market debate back in front of investors.</p>
<p>Here is the honest answer, and it comes in two halves. Over the past 50 years, stocks have beaten gold on total return, and it is not close. Over the past 25 years, gold has beaten the S&P 500.</p>
<p>What should you make of that information? Essentially, the takeaway is that the winner depends almost entirely on the year you start your count.</p>
<p>This page lays out the numbers for every major time window. It explains why the lead keeps changing hands from one era to the next. Beyond that, it covers what that means for how much you should diversify into gold.</p>
<p><strong>Since 1971, the S&P 500 has returned about 11.2% a year with dividends reinvested. Gold has returned about 8.8% a year. But the ranking flips over shorter windows. From 1971 to 1980, gold beat stocks. The same trend held from 2000 to 2011. It beat the S&P 500 in 2025 as well.</strong></p>
<h2>Gold vs. the Stock Market: Returns at a Glance</h2>
<p>Gold vs. the S&P 500: annualized returns by time period. S&P 500 figures are total return with dividends reinvested.</p>
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<th class="p-3 text-left text-sm font-semibold">Period</th>
<th class="p-3 text-left text-sm font-semibold">Gold (annualized)</th>
<th class="p-3 text-left text-sm font-semibold">S&P 500 (annualized, total return)</th>
<th class="p-3 text-left text-sm font-semibold">Winner</th>
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<th scope="row" class="p-3 text-left text-sm font-semibold text-slate-900">Since 1971 (post-gold standard)</th>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">8.8%</td>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">11.3%</td>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">▲ Stocks</td>
</tr>
<tr class="divide-x divide-slate-200 even:bg-slate-50">
<th scope="row" class="p-3 text-left text-sm font-semibold text-slate-900">Last 50 years</th>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">7.5%</td>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">11.9%</td>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">▲ Stocks</td>
</tr>
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<th scope="row" class="p-3 text-left text-sm font-semibold text-slate-900">Last 30 years</th>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">8.2%</td>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">10.5%</td>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">▲ Stocks</td>
</tr>
<tr class="divide-x divide-slate-200 even:bg-slate-50">
<th scope="row" class="p-3 text-left text-sm font-semibold text-slate-900">Last 25 years</th>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">11.6%</td>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">9.6%</td>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">▲ Gold</td>
</tr>
<tr class="divide-x divide-slate-200 even:bg-slate-50">
<th scope="row" class="p-3 text-left text-sm font-semibold text-slate-900">Last 20 years</th>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">9.8%</td>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">11.3%</td>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">▲ Stocks</td>
</tr>
<tr class="divide-x divide-slate-200 even:bg-slate-50">
<th scope="row" class="p-3 text-left text-sm font-semibold text-slate-900">Last 10 years</th>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">11.9%</td>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">15.1%</td>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">▲ Stocks</td>
</tr>
<tr class="divide-x divide-slate-200 even:bg-slate-50">
<th scope="row" class="p-3 text-left text-sm font-semibold text-slate-900">Last 5 years</th>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">17.7%</td>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">12.9%</td>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">▲ Gold</td>
</tr>
<tr class="divide-x divide-slate-200 even:bg-slate-50">
<th scope="row" class="p-3 text-left text-sm font-semibold text-slate-900">2025 calendar year</th>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">+67.1%</td>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">+17.9%</td>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">▲ Gold</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
<p><em>Gold returns based on LBMA PM gold price fixes. S&P 500 returns are total return with dividends reinvested, per S&P Dow Jones Indices. Data as of [Month D, YYYY]. Past performance does not guarantee future results.</em></p>
<h3>What $10,000 invested in 1971 would be worth today</h3>
<p>In January 1971, gold traded near $38 an ounce in London. So, $10,000 would have bought approximately 261 troy ounces of gold. Assuming you kept all of that gold until today and did not trade any of it, at July’s closing spot price that gold stack would be worth roughly $1,055,157.</p>
<p>Now, let’s run a similar test with the stock market. Go back to 1971 and put $10,000 in the S&P 500, then reinvest every dividend. Using the close of July as our cutoff date once again, that investment would now be worth roughly $3,553,798.</p>
<p>That is more than three times the gold result. Does this mean that gold did not perform well? Hardly. Gold grew the original stake 105x.</p>
<p>Stocks simply do something that gold cannot do. Stocks pay dividends along the way, which an investor can use to buy more shares. Those increased shares can acquire even more dividends.</p>
<h3>Why the time window changes the answer</h3>
<p>Most of the online argument about gold and stocks is really an argument about start dates.</p>
<p>If you start the clock in 1971, stocks will win against gold by a solid margin. If you begin your count in 2000, gold will win instead.</p>
<p>Neither side is lying when they proclaim their strengths. They are simply measuring different stretches of the same history.</p>
<p>The industry has a name for this effect: the start-date bias. It shows up any time someone picks one chart and calls the question settled.</p>
<p>Fortunately, there is a simple fix. All you have to do is look at several windows at once, which the table above does. When you do, you will see that gold leads in some periods and trails in others. That pattern tells you something real about how the metal behaves. Looking at a single date range will not give you as accurate of an assessment.</p>
<h2>When Gold Beats Stocks (and Why)</h2>
<p>Gold and stocks do not trade places every other year. Each one tends to lead for years at a time, rather than fluctuating. The handoffs line up with major shifts in monetary policy, which in turn affects investors’ confidence in the dollar. Five eras since 1971 demonstrate this principle.</p>
<p><strong>1971 to 1980: gold's first decade.</strong> In August 1971, Nixon closed the gold window. That severed the dollar’s last formal link to gold. Inflation reached double digits by the end of the decade. That led to a major shift for the <a href="https://www.moneymetals.com/gold-price">gold price</a>. At the start of the decade, gold was fixed at $35 per ounce under Bretton Woods, though it already traded near $38 in the London market. By January 1980, it peaked above $800. Stocks went almost nowhere in real terms during this time.</p>
<p><strong>1980 to 2000: gold's lost 20 years.</strong> Paul Volcker pushed interest rates to nearly 20% to break inflation. It worked. What followed was two decades of falling inflation and a historic bull market in stocks. Gold performed inversely. It drifted downhill for 20 years and finished under $300 an ounce, a significant decline from its January 1980 high. Anyone who bought the 1980 top waited a generation to break even. That is the honest cost of buying gold at the wrong moment.</p>
<p><strong>2000 to 2011: gold's second decade.</strong> The dot-com crash, 9/11, and the financial crisis stacked up back to back. Confidence in paper assets fell. Gold climbed from under $300 to roughly $1,900 by September 2011. The S&P 500 ended the stretch below where it began.</p>
<p><strong>2011 to 2018: stocks take the lead back.</strong> Gold gave back much of its gain and bottomed near $1,050 in December 2015. It then moved sideways for years. Stocks ran hard through the same period. This is the stretch gold skeptics point to, and they are not wrong about it.</p>
<p><strong>2019 to today: gold's third act.</strong> Central banks became steady net buyers. Government debt climbed. Inflation returned. Several countries began trimming their dollar reserves. Gold broke past $2,000 and kept going. It gained roughly 48% in 2025 and traded near $4,043 at the close of July.</p>
<p>The pattern is not a promise. Nothing guarantees the next handoff arrives on any kind of schedule. However, the record does show a rhythm. Gold tends to lead when confidence in currencies and policy is falling. Stocks tend to lead when it is rising.</p>
<h3>How gold performed in each major stock market crash</h3>
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<th class="p-3 text-left text-sm font-semibold">Decline</th>
<th class="p-3 text-left text-sm font-semibold">S&P 500</th>
<th class="p-3 text-left text-sm font-semibold">Gold</th>
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<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700"><strong>1973–74 bear market</strong> Jan 11, 1973 – Oct 3, 1974</td>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">▼ 48.2%</td>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">▲ 143%</td>
</tr>
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<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700"><strong>Black Monday</strong> Aug 25 – Dec 4, 1987</td>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">▼ 33.5%</td>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">▲ 5.6%</td>
</tr>
<tr class="divide-x divide-slate-200 even:bg-slate-50">
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700"><strong>Dot-com crash</strong> Mar 24, 2000 – Oct 9, 2002</td>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">▼ 49.1%</td>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">▲ 15.1%</td>
</tr>
<tr class="divide-x divide-slate-200 even:bg-slate-50">
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700"><strong>Financial crisis</strong> Oct 9, 2007 – Mar 9, 2009</td>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">▼ 56.8%</td>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">▲ 25.0%</td>
</tr>
<tr class="divide-x divide-slate-200 even:bg-slate-50">
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700"><strong>COVID crash</strong> Feb 19 – Mar 23, 2020 (Gold fell too)</td>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">▼ 33.9%</td>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">▼ 3.5%</td>
</tr>
<tr class="divide-x divide-slate-200 even:bg-slate-50">
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700"><strong>2022 bear market</strong> Jan 3 – Oct 12, 2022 (Gold fell too)</td>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">▼ 25.4%</td>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">▼ 7.4%</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
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<p><em>Measured closing peak to closing trough on a price basis, over the identical window for both assets. S&P 500 levels per S&P Dow Jones Indices; gold per London/LBMA fixes and daily spot closes. Gold pays no dividend and the S&P figures exclude dividends, so the two columns are directly comparable. Past performance does not guarantee future results.</em></p>
<p>Gold does not rise in every downturn. It fell alongside stocks twice in this table. In March 2020, investors sold whatever they could to raise cash, and gold dropped 3.5% before recovering within weeks. In 2022 it fell 7.4% while the Fed raised rates hard, even though inflation was running at a forty-year high. Rising real interest rates work against gold, and that pressure can outweigh the safe-haven bid. Gold is a hedge, not a guarantee.</p>
<h3>The gold-to-S&P 500 ratio</h3>
<p>There is a simpler way to see who is winning. Divide the S&P 500 by the price of gold. The answer tells you how many ounces of gold it takes to buy the index.</p>
<p>The number matters less than its direction. A rising ratio means stocks are gaining on gold. A falling ratio means gold is gaining on stocks. The long swings in this measure line up closely with the five eras above.</p>
<p>The ratio predicts nothing on its own. It is a scoreboard, not a signal. But it does strip out dollar inflation, because both sides of the division are priced in dollars. That makes it a cleaner read on relative value than either chart alone.</p>
<h2>Why Gold and Stocks Behave Differently</h2>
<p>The return numbers show what happened, but they do not give a rationale as to why it happened. Gold and stocks behave differently because they are different kinds of assets.</p>
<p>A share is a slice of a company that earns money. Gold is a metal that sits in a vault and earns nothing. Almost every difference below flows from that one fact.</p>
<p>How physical gold and stocks differ as portfolio assets.</p>
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<th class="p-3 text-left text-sm font-semibold">Attribute</th>
<th class="p-3 text-left text-sm font-semibold">Physical gold</th>
<th class="p-3 text-left text-sm font-semibold">Stocks</th>
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<th scope="row" class="p-3 text-left text-sm font-semibold text-slate-900">Produces income</th>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">No</td>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">Yes — dividends</td>
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<tr class="divide-x divide-slate-200 even:bg-slate-50">
<th scope="row" class="p-3 text-left text-sm font-semibold text-slate-900">Counterparty risk</th>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">None when held physically</td>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">Issuer, exchange, custodian</td>
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<th scope="row" class="p-3 text-left text-sm font-semibold text-slate-900">Correlation to S&P 500</th>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">Near zero over long periods</td>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">—</td>
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<th scope="row" class="p-3 text-left text-sm font-semibold text-slate-900">In high inflation</th>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">Historically strong</td>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">Mixed</td>
</tr>
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<th scope="row" class="p-3 text-left text-sm font-semibold text-slate-900">In a falling dollar</th>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">Historically strong</td>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">Mixed</td>
</tr>
<tr class="divide-x divide-slate-200 even:bg-slate-50">
<th scope="row" class="p-3 text-left text-sm font-semibold text-slate-900">Primary role</th>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">Wealth preservation</td>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">Wealth accumulation</td>
</tr>
<tr class="divide-x divide-slate-200 even:bg-slate-50">
<th scope="row" class="p-3 text-left text-sm font-semibold text-slate-900">Volatility</th>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">Moderate</td>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">Moderate to high</td>
</tr>
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<th scope="row" class="p-3 text-left text-sm font-semibold text-slate-900">Liquidity</th>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">High</td>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">High</td>
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<tr class="divide-x divide-slate-200 even:bg-slate-50">
<th scope="row" class="p-3 text-left text-sm font-semibold text-slate-900">Ongoing cost</th>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">Storage and insurance</td>
<td class="p-3 text-sm text-slate-700">Fund fees, if any</td>
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</tbody>
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<p><em>General characteristics, not guarantees. Individual results vary by holding method, time period, and market conditions.</em></p>
<h3>The dividend gap is the real long-term difference</h3>
<p>Go back to the 50-year gap. Stocks returned about 11.2% a year since 1971. Gold returned about 8.8%. That looks decisive.</p>
<p>Now strip the dividends out. The price-only return on the S&P 500 over the same stretch is roughly 8.2% a year. Gold's is roughly 8.8%.</p>
<p>Read those two numbers again. Without reinvested dividends, gold edges out the index.</p>
<p>This does not make dividends a trick. They are real money, and reinvesting them is the right way to measure what stocks return.</p>
<p>However, it does isolate the difference precisely. Stocks do not beat gold because share prices climb faster. They beat gold because companies pay you while you wait, and that cash buys more shares.</p>
<h3>Near-zero correlation is the actual case for gold</h3>
<p>Here is the part most comparisons miss. <strong>Gold is not trying to beat stocks</strong>.</p>
<p>Over long periods, the correlation between gold and the S&P 500 sits near zero. The two do not move together in any reliable way.</p>
<p>That is not some kind of flaw. Rather, it is often what drives gold investment.</p>
<p>A portfolio of assets that all rise and fall together is only diversified on paper. Adding something that moves on its own schedule steadies the whole portfolio. That remains true even when the asset returns less by itself.</p>
<p>So which one wins is the wrong question. Gold and stocks are not two horses in one race.</p>
<p>Stocks grow wealth over time.</p>
<p>Gold functions more like insurance. It carries a real cost, since it pays nothing and has to be stored. However, it does not depend on any company staying profitable. That makes it a useful tool for preserving wealth.</p>
<p>That leads to the question worth asking. If gold has a different job from stocks, how much of it do you need?</p>
<h2>Physical Gold vs. Gold Stocks vs. Gold ETFs</h2>
<p>Some readers searching for gold versus the stock market are asking a narrower question. They already want gold exposure. They want to know which form to buy. There are three, and they are not interchangeable.</p>
<p><strong>Physical bullion.</strong> You own the metal outright. No issuer can default on it and no fund can change its terms. That is the appeal of a bullion investment. There are some practical tradeoffs though. You have to store it and insure it, and the gap between buy and sell prices is wider than on a stock.</p>
<p><strong>Mining stocks.</strong> Shares in gold miners often move more than gold itself in either direction. When the metal rises, a miner's profit margin can rise faster. Still, a mining share remains a stock. It carries management risk, country risk, and the risk of dilution. It also tends to fall with the broad market in a selloff. That last point matters most here. If you wanted gold to diversify away from stocks, mining shares undo part of that work.</p>
<p><strong>Gold ETFs.</strong> These track the gold price and trade like any share, which makes them simple to buy and sell. What you hold in an <a href="https://www.investopedia.com/gold-and-gold-mining-etfs-8431193">ETF is a claim</a>, not the actual metal. There is a sponsor, a custodian, and a set of rules that can change. For some investors the convenience is worth it. For others, it removes the entire incentive structure for buying gold.</p>
<p>None of these is the right answer for everyone. They are answers to different priorities.</p>
<h2>How Much Gold Belongs in a Portfolio?</h2>
<p>There is no correct number here. Anyone who hands you one without knowing your situation is simply guessing. What follows is not advice. It is a plain summary of how the question gets approached, so you can think it through with someone qualified to see your full picture.</p>
<p><strong>What practitioners commonly cite.</strong> A 5% to 10% allocation is the range mentioned most often for investors who want some protection without changing the character of their portfolio. Investors focused on currency risk sometimes cite 10% to 20%. These numbers are more the result of conventions than of any hard data. Different advisors defend different numbers, and none of them knows your particular financial situation.</p>
<p><strong>What moves the number:</strong> Four things matter more than the rest.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Time horizon.</strong> A longer runway favors assets that compound on their own.</li>
<li><strong>Income needs.</strong> Gold pays nothing, so income has to come from somewhere else.</li>
<li><strong>Existing concentration.</strong> Someone holding mostly company stock has a different problem than someone in a broad index fund.</li>
<li><strong>Years to retirement.</strong> The closer you are, the more a deep drawdown costs you, because there is less time left to recover.</li>
</ul>
<p><strong>The rebalancing argument.</strong> This part usually gets skipped. Gold and stocks move on their own schedules, so over time they drift away from your target mix. Rebalancing brings them back into alignment.</p>
<p>The effect is mechanical. You trim whatever ran up and add to whatever lagged, without forecasting anything. Low correlation is what makes the mechanism work at all. Rebalancing does not promise better returns. It keeps your risk near the level you chose.</p>
<h3>Gold in an IRA</h3>
<p>You do not have to choose between gold and a retirement account. A <a href="https://www.moneymetals.com/programs/iras">precious metals IRA</a> holds physical bullion in a tax-advantaged account. It can sit alongside the stocks and funds you already own. The rules on eligible metals and approved custodians are specific. Read them before you open one.</p>
<h3>Frequently Asked Questions</h3>
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<p>Neither is better in every case. They are two assets that perform different jobs. Stocks grow wealth over time, mostly through reinvested dividends. Gold retains value when currencies and confidence weaken. Most investors who own gold own stocks too. The real question is how much of each, not which one.</p>
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<h4 class="text-xl font-semibold"><button id="controlsAccordionItemTwo" type="button" class="flex w-full cursor-pointer items-center justify-between gap-2 bg-slate-200 p-4 text-left underline-offset-2 duration-200 hover:bg-slate-100 focus-visible:bg-slate-50 focus-visible:underline focus-visible:outline-hidden" aria-controls="accordionItemTwo" x-on:click="isExpanded = ! isExpanded" x-bind:class="isExpanded ? 'font-bold' : 'font-medium'" x-bind:aria-expanded="isExpanded ? 'true' : 'false'"> <span>Has gold outperformed the stock market?</span> <svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" viewbox="0 0 24 24" fill="none" stroke-width="2" stroke="currentColor" class="size-5 shrink-0 transition" aria-hidden="true" x-bind:class="isExpanded ? 'rotate-180' : ''"> <path stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" d="M19.5 8.25l-7.5 7.5-7.5-7.5"></path> </svg> </button></h4>
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<p>Over some stretches, yes. Since 2000, gold has beaten the S&P 500. Since 1971, stocks have won by a wide margin when reinvested dividends are factored in. Both statements are true. The answer turns on the start date, which is why any single chart can mislead.</p>
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<p>Often, but not always. Gold rose about 25% while the S&P 500 fell 57% in the 2007 to 2009 crisis. But it fell 3.5% in the COVID crash and 7.4% during the 2022 bear market. Gold is a hedge, not a guarantee.</p>
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<h4 class="text-xl font-semibold"><button id="controlsAccordionItemFour" type="button" class="flex w-full cursor-pointer items-center justify-between gap-2 bg-slate-200 p-4 text-left underline-offset-2 duration-200 hover:bg-slate-100 focus-visible:bg-slate-50 focus-visible:underline focus-visible:outline-hidden" aria-controls="accordionItemFour" x-on:click="isExpanded = ! isExpanded" x-bind:class="isExpanded ? 'font-bold' : 'font-medium'" x-bind:aria-expanded="isExpanded ? 'true' : 'false'"> <span>What does Warren Buffett say about gold?</span> <svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" viewbox="0 0 24 24" fill="none" stroke-width="2" stroke="currentColor" class="size-5 shrink-0 transition" aria-hidden="true" x-bind:class="isExpanded ? 'rotate-180' : ''"> <path stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" d="M19.5 8.25l-7.5 7.5-7.5-7.5"></path> </svg> </button></h4>
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<p>Buffett has long argued that gold produces nothing. It pays no dividend and earns nothing, so its price rests on what the next buyer will pay. That criticism is fair on its own terms. Supporters answer that gold's job is holding value, not producing income.</p>
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<h4 class="text-xl font-semibold"><button id="controlsAccordionItemFive" type="button" class="flex w-full cursor-pointer items-center justify-between gap-2 bg-slate-200 p-4 text-left underline-offset-2 duration-200 hover:bg-slate-100 focus-visible:bg-slate-50 focus-visible:underline focus-visible:outline-hidden" aria-controls="accordionItemFive" x-on:click="isExpanded = ! isExpanded" x-bind:class="isExpanded ? 'font-bold' : 'font-medium'" x-bind:aria-expanded="isExpanded ? 'true' : 'false'"> <span>Why don't billionaires invest in gold?</span> <svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" viewbox="0 0 24 24" fill="none" stroke-width="2" stroke="currentColor" class="size-5 shrink-0 transition" aria-hidden="true" x-bind:class="isExpanded ? 'rotate-180' : ''"> <path stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" d="M19.5 8.25l-7.5 7.5-7.5-7.5"></path> </svg> </button></h4>
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<p>Many do, and central banks buy it in bulk. Central banks have been steady net buyers in recent years. They add gold as a reserve asset as a way of diversifying away from the dollar and other paper currencies or digital assets. Some well-known investors avoid gold while others hold it. The premise of the question is wrong.</p>
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<h4 class="text-xl font-semibold"><button id="controlsAccordionItemSix" type="button" class="flex w-full cursor-pointer items-center justify-between gap-2 bg-slate-200 p-4 text-left underline-offset-2 duration-200 hover:bg-slate-100 focus-visible:bg-slate-50 focus-visible:underline focus-visible:outline-hidden" aria-controls="accordionItemSix" x-on:click="isExpanded = ! isExpanded" x-bind:class="isExpanded ? 'font-bold' : 'font-medium'" x-bind:aria-expanded="isExpanded ? 'true' : 'false'"> <span>What if I invested $1,000 in gold 10 years ago?</span> <svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" viewbox="0 0 24 24" fill="none" stroke-width="2" stroke="currentColor" class="size-5 shrink-0 transition" aria-hidden="true" x-bind:class="isExpanded ? 'rotate-180' : ''"> <path stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" d="M19.5 8.25l-7.5 7.5-7.5-7.5"></path> </svg> </button></h4>
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<p>Gold traded near $1,340 an ounce in August 2016. At roughly $4,043, a $1,000 stake would be worth about $3,017. That figure excludes storage and insurance costs. Past performance does not predict future results.</p>
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<h4 class="text-xl font-semibold"><button id="controlsAccordionItemSeven" type="button" class="flex w-full cursor-pointer items-center justify-between gap-2 bg-slate-200 p-4 text-left underline-offset-2 duration-200 hover:bg-slate-100 focus-visible:bg-slate-50 focus-visible:underline focus-visible:outline-hidden" aria-controls="accordionItemSeven" x-on:click="isExpanded = ! isExpanded" x-bind:class="isExpanded ? 'font-bold' : 'font-medium'" x-bind:aria-expanded="isExpanded ? 'true' : 'false'"> <span>Does gold protect against inflation?</span> <svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" viewbox="0 0 24 24" fill="none" stroke-width="2" stroke="currentColor" class="size-5 shrink-0 transition" aria-hidden="true" x-bind:class="isExpanded ? 'rotate-180' : ''"> <path stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" d="M19.5 8.25l-7.5 7.5-7.5-7.5"></path> </svg> </button></h4>
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<p>Over long periods, and in high-inflation decades, gold has held purchasing power well. The 1970s are the clearest case. Year to year the link is loose, and gold can fall while prices rise. Treat it as long-run protection, not a short-term inflation trade.</p>
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<h5 class="text-2xl mt-8">Conclusion</h5>
<p>So which one wins? Both, in turn.</p>
<p>Over 50 years, stocks have won on total return. Most of that edge came from reinvested dividends, not from faster price growth. Over the last 25 years, gold has won. In most major crises gold held up while stocks fell, though not in every one.</p>
<p>That record does not point to one answer. It points to two roles. Stocks build wealth. Gold guards it. How much of each you hold is a question only you and a qualified advisor can settle.</p>
