Ahead Of Festivals - Is Gold Still A Good Investment?

Gold prices saw a dramatic 40 per cent upswing and then a small correction in August. Analysts said the yellow metal still offers investment opportunities because the reasons that led to price hike will remain unchanged over coming months

- Yagnesh Kansara

Gold demand in India’s retail sector has plunged to a 26-year low while the price rose to an all-time high of ₹55,000 per 10 grams. Within this seeming contradiction is the curious plan of many factors, some global, and local.

And yet, gold will continue to play a significant role in Indian as it did in the days of Samudragupta, 375 CE, son of the Gupta emperor Chandragupta, who issued gold currency and performed the Ashvameda (horse) sacrifice to establish in war victories.

Gold is present in India life at various levels: as an emotional and safety anchor, as an hedge against inflation and also figures in the political sphere.

External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar last year referred to the wholesome transfer of wealth by the British, some of which was in gold. “India had two centuries of humiliation by the West in its predatory form it came to India in the mid-18th century,” he said.

“An economic study tried to estimate how much British took out of India, it ended up at a number of $45 trillion in today’s value,” Jaishankar said at the noted think tank Atlantic Council in Washington DC.

But it is to the Bank of England that the then government of PV Narsimha Rao turned to when it decided to pledge the nation’s family gold for a loan to tide over an economic crisis in 1991. India mortgaged 67 tonnes of Gold to raise $600 million to prevent itself from defaulting on import payments. However, the Reserve Bank of India was quick to buy back the pledged gold in December that year.

The RBI learnt its lesson and has been steadily buying gold year after year with the present level of stock rising nearly 10 times to 653 tonnes. It bought 40.45 tonnes of gold in financial year 2019-20.