Gold is one of the most highly-desired and useful metals in the world. Not only can it be beautifully shaped and sculpted, the precious yellow metal conducts electricity and does not tarnish. These qualities make it the metal of choice for the industrial, medical and technology industries, just to name a few.
Technological innovation has blessed us with many wonderful, modern gadgets, but have you ever considered what metals and minerals are used to power them?
Take the example of your mobile phone – most people are inseparable from their beloved iPhones these days (guilty as charged) – and these amazing gadgets are virtual gold mines. Well, not quite.
Many important metals and minerals are now used in your mobile phone’s electronics to enable high-speed performance and data, improved video and gaming and a more vivid and detailed screen.
If you are being objective, you can't really explain the price of gold by looking at its uses. Sure it looks good in jewellery but most of the gold doesn't end up in jewellery, it sits in locked vaults gathering dust. There is now enough stored gold above ground to keep the jewellery market supplied for hundreds of years without needing to mine any more. So logically the price should crash and nobody should bother mining it any more. In fact people predict this all the time but it never happens.