Gold has had a special value for human beings and the ruling classes of ancient Egypt knew the value of gold, several thousand years ago. This attraction to gold continued into the modern age, but in the twentieth century, this attraction gave way to the attraction of stocks and shares. For a good many years, people made millions on the stock market, ignoring the lesson of the Wall Street crash. Now, just as in the late nineteen twenties, the stock market has floundered and property prices have fallen.
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For a long time, gold has been seen as a bad investment, but the tides are beginning to turn and those people who still have money may find it wiser to buy gold, than to leave their money in accessible accounts. The current financial crisis has hit everyone, and those people who still have money may do better to invest it in something tangible rather than leave it in the banks. Recent happenings on both sides of the Atlantic have revealed how much the banks need our money and how people stand to lose their funds because bankers have themselves made bad investments.

Over the last eighteen months or so, the western world in particular, has been going through the worst recession since the Wall Street crash and the depression of the nineteen thirties. Businesses are closing every day and people are finding it difficult to keep up their mortgage payments once they have been made redundant. It might be easier for those people who have received significant redundancy payments, to ensure their future by investing at least some of their payout in gold.

For many years a country’s gold standard has been the measure of its wealth. Although gold became unfashionable and people opened up Swiss bank accounts and invested in property, in recent months there has been a renewed interest in the value of gold. Those people who are fortunate enough not to have lost their pension funds to unscrupulous speculators and bankers may find that their wealth is safer if they buy gold. In spite of the fact that property prices are falling and most areas are experiencing a drop back in the value of what they own; gold is on the rise again. The rising value of gold is due to a number of factors, not least the falling pound and dollar, and buying gold is a safer option than putting your money in the bank.

Those people who have had the money and the time to keep an eye on the stock market are now finding that the market is letting them down. Investing in stocks and shares is no longer a viable option when the official receiver is moving in on an increasing number of businesses every day. The only stock that still appears to have some value is gold, and those investors who really know the market are now choosing to buy gold over any other kind of stock or investment. As the value of gold increases, the time to buy gold is now.