Gold has seen around 3.5% gains in 2020 already, but one investment firm thinks the yellow metal will outgain the S&P 500 over the course of the year.
Gold’s surge was part of CLSA’s “Global Surprises 2020” report, and the firm based out of Hong Kong had a good run in 2019, with 70% of its predictions hitting the mark.
“If investors are concerned about the role of liquidity in recent equity market strength … gold provides a hedge that could perform across multiple scenarios,” CLSA Head of Research Shaun Cochran said in an interview with Forbes.
And gold is easily one of the most liquid assets traded today. According to the World Gold Council, its trading volume averages $112 billion per day, which blows the Dow Jones Industrial Average’s $23 billion per day out of the water.
Gold opened the year around $1517.31 and has since risen around 3.5% to $1,566 Tuesday. The precious metal topped $1,600 briefly in January after an Iranian missile strike on Iraqi bases housing American troops, but it has since settled into the $1,560 to $1,570 range.
The S&P 500 is barely beating out gold so far with year-to-date gains of 3.6% as of Tuesday afternoon.
Cochran believes gold can be especially fruitful during periods of loose monetary policy.
“(I)n the event that growth disappoints the market’s expectations, gold is positively leveraged to the inevitable policy response of lower rates and larger central bank balance sheets,” Cochran said.
The U.S. Federal Reserve cut its key interest rate policy three times in 2019, and Fed Chief Jerome Powell signaled once again the central bank’s intent to hold those rates steady during a Congress hearing Tuesday.
Frank Holmes of Great Speculations doesn’t know if the precious metal can actually break out this year and beat the S&P 500, but he does note that gold has been a great long-term investment.
For the 20-year period through the end of 2019, gold crushed the market two-to-one, returning 451.8% compared to the S&P’s 223.6%. That comes out to a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 8.78% for gold, 4.03% for the S&P.
CLSA isn’t the only one that is bullish on gold. Bridgewater Associates CIO Greg Jensen sees gold surging past $2,000 amid market volatility and a continually easy Fed, which he sees cutting rates again in 2020.
Trends Journal publisher Gerald Celente also sees the yellow metal rising as fears surrounding the coronavirus ebb and flow, and the Fed cuts rates to zero, or even negative.
“I’m forecasting that by November, you’re going to see interest rates down to near negative or zero interest rates, and that’s going to be very bullish for gold,” Celente said in a recent interview.