“What the heck is going on?”
Someone realized that gold is a scam.
Gold is not an investment. At best, own some gold coins as part of a “get the heck out of dodge” fund.
Which, as things are going, is probably a good thing to have. May have use them to bribe a border guard in Costa Rica someday.
That's right -- gold is a store of value. In the early sixties, you could buy 12 barrels of oil ($3) for an ounce of gold ($35). In 2010 you can still buy about the same amount of oil for an ounce ($1000/12 = $83).
The day to day ups and downs of gold's value relative to the dollar don't matter in the long run. Gold maintains its value -- the dollar fluctuates.
I see it as a way of helping to survive if/when the dollar collapses to zero or so near zero as to make it impractical to use.
Note I said ‘helping to survive’. I don’t see it as a total solution, only part of a survival package.
Investment? I agree with you, mostly, that it’s not a long term investment. But only because I sincerely think the dollar will be worthless or impractical in the near- to mid-term.
But I disagree with you about gold being a scam. Now if you said some gold dealers are scamming people, I’d agree, I think (depending on how you phrased it and defined it).