GOLD

Gold (Au, from the Latin aurum) is one of the oldest metals known to humans, prized since antiquity for its rarity, luster, and resistance to tarnish; properties that let it serve as both an ornamental and monetary metal for millennia without needing alloying to be usable. Unlike bulk industrial commodities like iron ore or copper, gold's value has always rested as much on scarcity and trust as on utility, which is why it evolved into humanity's original store of value long before coined currency existed.

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Jewelry remains gold's largest single use by a wide margin: jewelry manufacturing accounts for roughly 30% to 50% of total gold demand, with China and India as the world's leading consumers, and gold is typically alloyed with metals like silver and copper to adjust color and hardness, an alloy of 75% gold, 16% silver, and 9% copper produces yellow gold, while adding more copper shifts it toward rose or red gold. But the second-biggest demand driver today is investment, not consumption: investment accounted for over 43.5% of global gold demand in 2025, around 2,175 metric tons, making it the single largest demand sector that year, a sign of gold's dual identity as both a wearable luxury good and a financial safe-haven asset that central banks and investors turn to during economic uncertainty. 

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Beyond jewelry and investment, gold plays a smaller but technically important industrial role. Its high conductivity, malleability, and chemical stability make it essential in electronics, dentistry, and medical applications, with the electronics industry alone representing 70% to 80% of all technology and industrial gold demand. Gold's electrical conductivity, corrosion resistance, and malleability make it ideal for electrical components, aerospace systems, and medical technology, and its catalytic properties are also valuable in chemical processes used in fuel cells and automotive catalysts. It has even been used in dentistry since as early as 700 B.C., prized for being chemically inert, nonallergenic, and easy for dentists to work with. The contrast with iron ore is stark: where iron ore's fate is tied almost entirely to steel and construction, gold's demand is split across beauty, trust, and just enough irreplaceable technical utility to keep it embedded in nearly every modern smartphone and satellite