So… is the Gold Boom Over?

Sovereign Man provides actionable intelligence and rational solutions for personal liberty and financial prosperity. Read more at www.sovereignman.com

It wasn’t until somewhat recent history that the price of gold was less than $1,000 per troy ounce.

Now (as you probably know), the price of gold has just dropped by $1,000 in only a matter of days. Silver’s decline was even more violent.

Much ink has already been spilled over this, suggesting that “the gold bubble has burst”. Naturally we have a different view.

It started on Thursday when the White House announced that Kevin Warsh would be nominated as the next Federal Reserve Chairman.

Warsh is known to be ‘hawkish’, prompting speculation that he would keep rates higher to combat inflation. A lot of people obviously viewed this as bad for gold, prompting an unprecedented wave of selling.

So is that it? Is the precious metals boom over?

Not by a long shot.

Again, I don’t say that because of any fanaticism over precious metals. I don’t fall in love with any asset.

But I do understand the big picture story driving gold prices, and that story hasn’t changed.

(Note: we’re going to focus on gold in this article and leave silver for another time, since silver has different factors at play.)

The first thing that’s important to remember is the reason WHY gold reached such heights over the past few years: foreign central banks.

Central banks have always purchased gold as a strategic reserve asset; this is nothing new. In fact, in 2018 and 2019, before Covid upended the world, central bank gold purchases totaled roughly 650 metric tons.

By 2022, however, central banks started purchasing a LOT more gold— roughly 1,000 metric tons per year, a 50% increase over the long-term average.

The same thing happened in 2023. And again in 2024.

Those extra central bank gold purchases caused a surge in demand… and gold prices roughly doubled in price over that three-year period.

So what was so special about 2022 that prompted central banks to start buying more gold?

Simple. It was the start of a long-term trend of foreign countries losing faith in the US government.

They watched Joe Biden shake hands with thin air. They witnessed the humiliating debacle in Afghanistan. They observed rising US budget deficits and a national debt spiraling out of control. They saw inflation rising.

All of these events made foreign governments and central banks question how much they wanted to keep buying Treasury bonds.

But the real watershed moment came after the invasion of Ukraine.

The US government’s response was to freeze Russian assets; Congress then soon passed the REPO Act, giving the President authority to seize Russian sovereign reserves.

This sent shockwaves through foreign governments around the world. Suddenly they felt like their money was no longer safe in America— that the US government could freeze their reserve assets without warning.

I’m not arguing whether this was right or wrong from a moral perspective. But from a practical standpoint, though, it had an obvious consequence: foreign countries wanted to start diversifying their reserve assets away from US dollars and from the United States.

And in their efforts to diversify away from the dollar, gold became the easiest strategic reserve asset for those foreign central banks to buy.

Again, the trend continued throughout 2023 and 2024.

2024 was particularly interesting because the gold price was clearly surging— almost exclusively due to foreign central bank demand.

Yet, despite gold’s obvious rise, individual investors weren’t having any of it. In fact, in 2024, gold ETF saw net OUTFLOWS totaling MINUS 2.9 metric tons. This means that individual investors were net sellers of gold, even as foreign central banks were buying by the ton.

2025 became the year gold went parabolic, rising to $4,500 by year end.

But they key growth driver in 2025 was not central banks. In fact, foreign central banks dialed back their purchases to around 800 metric tons last year—still more than normal, but less than the record 1,100 tons from 2024.

Individual investor demand made up the difference in a big way. Net ETF inflows swung from minus 2.9 tons to plus 801 tons. That’s a massive turnaround. On top of that, there was significantly more demand for gold bars and coins.

Bottom line, much of gold’s very recent parabolic price move is because small (and large) investors piled in. Those investors are now dumping their gold because they’re spooked about Kevin Warsh.

Our readers should not be surprised by this pullback; we’ve been talking about the possibility of a short-term shakeout for some time.

And I’m not smart enough to know what’s going to happen next week or next month, it’s clear that the real story (i.e. foreign governments and central banks losing confidence in the United States Congress) has not gone away.

Think about it— America is deeply divided. The Federal Reserve is in crisis. The US government has shut down for the second time in four months. The national debt keeps rising (now $38.6 trillion). And hardly anyone in Congress seems to care.

Do you think all of this makes foreign governments and central banks want to hold more of their reserve assets in the US, or less?

We think the answer is clearly less, and hence the trend that began in 2022 will likely continue.

Foreign governments and central banks are sitting on $10+ trillion in foreign reserves— most of that parked in US dollars.

Their “extra” gold purchases since 2022 (i.e. they amount of gold they bought each year above the historic average) only totals around $100 billion, i.e. roughly ONE PERCENT of their reserves.

Would it be so crazy to assume that they might want to diversify TWO percent? Or maybe 5%? If so, there could be a LOT more money coming in to gold.

And if a mere 1% of foreign reserves cause the gold price to skyrocket, how high will the gold price go if they park 5% or more?

Again, this isn’t something that’s going to happen tomorrow. It’s a long-term trend. But the point is that the story hasn’t changed.

Remember that in the early 1970s, the gold price increased 5x for similar reasons— US deficits and fiscal woes. But gold peaked in 1975, then fell by a whopping 40%.

A lot of people thought the gold boom was over. But it wasn’t. Again, the story hadn’t changed.

And shortly after, gold resumed its rise, climbing another 8x. It took the election of Ronald Reagan in 1980— someone who was serious about restoring fiscal order— for the trend to finally stop.

I don’t know how far gold might fall. But I do know the fundamental story hasn’t changed.

Source

Sovereign Man provides actionable intelligence and rational solutions for personal liberty and financial prosperity. Read more at www.sovereignman.com

Source: https://www.schiffsovereign.com/trends/so-is-the-gold-boom-over-154314/