Gold doesn't pay dividends. It doesn't generate earnings. It sits there. And yet, over virtually any multi-decade period in recorded history, gold has preserved purchasing power while paper currencies have lost it. This isn't ideology — it's a pattern repeated across Roman denarii, Weimar marks, Zimbabwean dollars, and now, arguably, the U.S. dollar.
Gold vs the money supply
Since 2020, the M2 money supply has expanded by 46%. Over that same period, gold has risen from approximately $1,520 per ounce to over $2,900 — a gain of roughly 91%. Gold didn't just keep pace with monetary expansion — it outpaced it by nearly double.
This outperformance isn't random. When central banks create money faster than economies produce goods, investors move to assets with limited supply. Gold's supply grows at roughly 1.5% per year through mining — far slower than M2's 3.9% annual growth. The gap between those two rates is why gold prices rise during periods of monetary expansion.
Why gold works differently than Bitcoin
Gold and Bitcoin both respond to monetary debasement, but they respond on different timescales and with different volatility profiles. Gold moves slowly and steadily. It rarely drops more than 20% in a year. Bitcoin can double or halve in months. For preserving purchasing power you need in the next one to five years, gold's stability is its primary advantage. For positioning against debasement over a decade or more, Bitcoin's higher ceiling (and lower floor) tells a different story.
The Debase Brief tracks both because they provide different signals. Gold confirming M2 expansion is a slower, more conservative indicator that institutional money sees what the data shows. Bitcoin confirming the same trend is a louder, more volatile signal from a different set of market participants.
Central banks are buying — a lot
Central banks globally added over 1,000 tonnes of gold to their reserves in both 2023 and 2024 — the highest sustained buying in decades. China, Poland, India, and Turkey have been the largest buyers. When the institutions that create fiat currency are simultaneously stockpiling gold, it's worth asking what they know about the currency they're printing.
Gold in the Debase Brief isn't a buy recommendation. It's a confirming signal. When gold rises alongside expanding M2, it confirms that monetary debasement is being priced into real markets, not just academic models.
What gold tells you about your salary
Here's a simple test: price your salary in gold. If you earned $80,000 in 2020, that was roughly 52 ounces of gold. Today, that same $80,000 buys about 27 ounces. In gold terms, your salary has been cut nearly in half — even if the number on your paycheck hasn't changed.
This isn't a gold-bug argument. It's a math exercise that illustrates what M2 expansion does to the purchasing power of a fixed salary. Use the calculator to see the specific impact on your paycheck, then draw your own conclusions about how to respond.