Imagine if the world had 60 years of oil production sitting in storage.
Right now, that sounds particularly absurd.
Access to oil is again moving markets. The Strait of Hormuz — historically a route for around one-fifth of global oil supply — remains disrupted by war, and markets are reacting to every sign that more supply might get through.
Gold is different.
The world already has around 60 years of current annual gold production above ground.
And almost all of it is still here.
So why doesn’t all that gold make gold cheap?
Gold has a supply problem in reverse
Around 220,000 tonnes of gold have been mined throughout history.
Gold is virtually indestructible. We don’t burn it like oil. We don’t eat it like food. And only a small proportion is used in industry.
So it accumulates.
Last year, the world’s mines produced around 3,700 tonnes of new gold. Put that against the gold we have already accumulated and annual mine production adds less than 2% to the above-ground stock.
With almost any other commodity, decades of accumulated, largely intact supply would scream oversupply.
With gold, it hasn’t.
Because accumulating gold isn’t an unintended consequence.
Accumulating it is the point.
The stockpile is the strange part
Normally, a stockpile tells us that supply has exceeded demand.
Gold turns that logic on its head.
We have accumulated so much gold precisely because people have valued it enough to keep it.
For thousands of years, gold has moved from mines into jewellery, vaults, central-bank reserves and private holdings. It changes hands. It changes form.
But very little disappears.
That means gold’s enormous above-ground stock isn’t simply a measure of supply.
It’s also a record of centuries of demand.
And higher prices don’t necessarily bring it back
Of course, gold can come back onto the market.
If prices rise far enough, some owners sell and recycling increases.
But even here, gold can surprise.
The US-dollar gold price rose 67% during 2025. Yet recycled gold supply increased just 3%.
That’s quite a gap.
There was plenty of gold that could have been sold.
Much of it wasn’t.
Which brings us to an important distinction.
Gold that exists and gold that’s for sale are not the same thing.
That’s the gold paradox
Gold isn’t scarce because we’re using it up.
We’re not.
Almost all the gold we’ve ever mined is still around, and each year we dig up more.
Yet households, investors and central banks continue to acquire it.
That’s what makes gold unusual.
With oil, consumption reduces the stockpile.
With gold, the stockpile itself tells us something.
People have been choosing to keep it for thousands of years.
And they’re still choosing to add to it.
Gold’s enormous stockpile isn’t evidence of oversupply. It’s evidence of demand.
