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Nick Murray published this essay in a financial planning periodical that I got a hold of this week.

One of my buddies sent it to me in the business.

It's very well done, and he's kind of a snarky like you, George.

That's why I like him.

I like just reading

this article yeah the persistent illusion of gold this is good yeah for the second for the record

the subtitle of the wall street journal piece is swings in stocks and bonds and boosted the metals

popularity with ordinary investments the statistic at the heart of the article is the percentage of Americans

who believe gold is the best long-term investment jumped to 26% this year from 15% in

2022, according to a Gallup report from May. In contrast, those preferring stocks dropped to

18% from 24% last year, while those favoring

bonds climbed to 7% from 4%.

This happens quite reliably every time there's a bare market in stocks.

Ordinary investors are always recalibrating their preferences in the rear view mirror.

Which is wrong.

My major purpose in this little essay is to parse through the pathology, which persists

in the illusion, not just that gold is an efficient inflation hedge, but that it's

somehow preferable to holding a broadly diversified portfolio of high quality common

stocks like a mutual fund for the long term.

First, let's get our terminology straight.

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