The past few weeks show, in other words, that gold is not a universal hedge. Still, gold’s chief historic appeal is not as protection against Gulf wars, or even an energy shock, but against the debasement of money. This is a giant risk amid mounting public debts, which governments may seek to inflate away. You would expect gold to rise when America wages another expensive war and other indebted countries consider subsidising citizens’ energy bills—but if only other things are equal. When the meme traders outnumber the debasement traders, and when institutional investors sell at a profit to cover losses on other assets, other things aren’t equal.
