Gold recently surpassed $4,000 for the first time ever, a major milestone in precious metal history. It was taking place in a time of general financial market turmoil. Consequently, investors are looking to gold as a haven more than ever. Traditional portfolio advice might tell you to invest 60% of your assets in stocks and 40% in bonds. Influential billionaire investor Ray Dalio is pushing a separate, more complex strategy that emphasizes the fundamental importance of gold in wealth preservation.
The spike in gold prices we’ve seen this fall indicates increasing fear among investors about credit markets. Far too many seem to be running away from conventional investment avenues and into gold with their money. This trend is remarkable indeed, as the S&P 500 index has finally put an end to this recent upward trend, following back -0.38% on Tuesday. Fears over the profitability of the artificial intelligence rollout triggered the drop. This concern only grew when Oracle’s Nvidia cloud business disclosed gross margins of only 14%, far below its total company margin of ~70%.
On Gold Rush Day, October 7, 2025, Witter Coins in San Francisco featured an one-ounce gold bar, gold nugget, and gold coins. This exhibit made the case for a burgeoning investor attraction to gold as an asset class. The pan-European Stoxx 600 index fell by 0.17%, giving up its daily advance. Beyond the numbers, this decline reflects a deeper feeling of retreat in the marketplace.
Given all this, Ray Dalio’s recent call for investors to buy gold could not be more timely and more opposite to standard investment wisdom. Retirement policy experts typically advocate for a balanced investment strategy, with a strong emphasis on equities. By contrast, Dalio argues that gold is critically important in crisis periods. This recommendation is very much in the spirit of what Warren Buffett fumed about back in 1998. Perhaps most famously though, he got to the nature of gold itself.
“It gets dug out of the ground in Africa, or someplace. Then we melt it down, dig another hole, bury it again and pay people to stand around guarding it. It has no utility. Anyone watching from Mars would be scratching their head.” – Warren Buffett
Despite Buffett’s skepticism, the current investment climate suggests that many are finding value in gold as an alternative to volatile equities and uncertain credit markets. Nvidia made headlines last week when it announced a deal to invest as much as $100 billion into OpenAI. This announcement adds a competitive angle to the AI race, which should further stoke investor enthusiasm.