PT - JOURNAL ARTICLE AU - Mitchell Ratner AU - Steven Klein TI - The Portfolio Implications of Gold Investment AID - 10.3905/joi.2008.701958 DP - 2008 Feb 29 TA - The Journal of Investing PG - 77--87 VI - 17 IP - 1 4099 - https://pm-research.com/content/17/1/77.short 4100 - https://pm-research.com/content/17/1/77.full AB - This article investigates the use of gold as an investment asset. The data consist of U.S. and foreign equity returns from 1975 to 2005. The results indicate that investment in gold is inferior to a simple buy-and-hold strategy of U.S. equities over the long term. Gold is often believed to provide potential as a defensive asset, given its low correlation with U.S. equities. However, a portfolio optimization technique using actual and simulated data indicates that the long-term portfolio benefits of holding gold are marginal at bestTOPICS: Other real assets, portfolio management/multi-asset allocation, performance measurement