8 In the ranking of price increases for as many as 46 types of assets—including currencies, bonds, stock indices, and commodity futures—gold ranked first.

August has just passed, and gold has been the best-performing asset of all. Against the backdrop of widespread declines in global stock markets, gold futures on the New York Mercantile Exchange rose by 3.4%, fully demonstrating gold’s appeal as a safe-haven asset.

Looking at the performance of various assets through the end of August, gold rose by 2.85%, followed by the euro, which gained 2.84%. Next were pork, the Japanese yen, orange juice, platinum, U.S. 30-year bonds, U.S. 10-year bonds, the Swiss franc, U.S. 5-year bonds, U.S. 2-year bonds, live cattle, rice, live cattle, sugar, the Canadian dollar, natural gas, the British pound, the Singapore dollar, the Australian dollar, cotton, corn, the U.S. dollar, copper, wheat, silver, cocoa, coffee, soybean meal, timber, alcohol, rapeseed oil, the S&P 500 Index, fuel oil, the Dow Jones Index, the Nasdaq 100 Index, soybeans, the Russell 2000 Index, palladium, the Nikkei Index, the EuroStoxx 50 Index, Germany’s DAX Index, soybean oil, Brent crude oil, U.S. West Texas Intermediate light crude oil, oats, and gasoline.

Among the rankings of price increases for as many as 46 types of assets—including currencies, bonds, stock indexes, and commodity futures—gold ranked first.

August was a turbulent month, during which volatility surged by as much as 76.39%. Crude oil and grains experienced the sharpest declines. Stock indices generally performed poorly, primarily because the Shanghai Composite Index plunged sharply by 21.81% in August, dragging down global stock markets—including U.S., European, and Japanese markets. Although stock markets have rebounded somewhat after the sharp drop and have largely stabilized, the question now is: Is this major global market turmoil merely a temporary pause, or a harbinger of an impending major collapse?

In the short term, gold prices may fall along with the stock market due to factors such as margin calls. However, in the long term, the gold market consistently moves in the opposite direction from the stock market.

In any case, the price of gold is significantly undervalued—and silver even more so. Due to the decline in gold prices, demand for physical gold has surged recently. Holdings in gold exchange-traded funds (ETFs) have begun to rise, and spot premiums have emerged on futures exchanges.

The New York Mercantile Exchange even witnessed an unusual occurrence: 63 August contracts failed to be delivered upon expiration—a phenomenon that hasn't happened in 40 years. Typically, futures contracts are delivered immediately upon expiration and never dragged all the way to the final deadline; delaying delivery would incur storage fees. Meanwhile, deliveries of gold coins and gold bars have also run into trouble—some mints have already allocated quotas or suspended deliveries altogether.

Recently, trading in silver futures has also been exceptionally robust—on a single trading day, the New York Mercantile Exchange’s volume reached 87% of the annual global production from all countries except China and Russia. Silver coin production in the United States and Canada can no longer meet demand. The U.S. Mint has raised the premium and has begun implementing rationing for wholesalers.

The current situation in which the book value of gold prices diverges from the spot price of physical gold cannot possibly last indefinitely. Let’s just wait and see how things will unfold.