A.I.M. Users Bulletin Board

[ls7550]

Gold is like a cross between undated zero coupon inflation bond and long volatility (stocks are like being short volatility)

Takes a bit of thought to get your head around this group of comparisons to see that though https://tinyurl.com/jyjhdsm

From a casual glance the more recent situation looks like it was gold up because long dated TIPS were up ??? (chicken and eggs (perhaps the other way around))

50/50 stock/gold is a short and long volatility barbell ... which is like a volatile bond bullet. Instead of 50/50 stock/bonds for instance 75/25 stock/gold might be used as a more volatile but perhaps more tax efficient substitute https://tinyurl.com/z2sah75

One final pair the first shows how stocks are like short volatility http://tinyurl.com/z44wc5c ZIV sells 5 month VIX futures and acts similar to being a 3x stock. This second http://tinyurl.com/jcd65fh uses XIV that shorts 30 day VIX futures and is more like a 5x long stock. If instead of allocating 20% 5x, 80% bonds in order to track 100% 1x long stock, you substitute in 50/50 stock/gold as the 'bonds' then if the choice of stock held pays no dividends nor does XIV nor does gold ... then you have a no dividend type long stock position - handy if otherwise dividends might be taxed relatively more than capital gains.

The growth charts in the above links are best viewed when the log scale box is ticked/checked.

Clive.