Long-form analyses from the Office.
The reading list and the empirical figures on /research point at four bodies of work the firm reads against — Ibbotson, the World Gold Council, John Exeter, CPM Group. The notes below are the synthesis: what the Office takes from each body of research, where the work converges, and where it leaves real questions unresolved. History and structure only. No allocation advice. No price predictions. Primary sources cited inline.
- 01
Gold and silver vs. the S&P 500.
Most readers arrive convinced of a single prior — that a directly-titled metals layer is a dead-money allocation. Over the most recent twenty-five-year window, April 2001 through April 2026, both gold and silver have materially outperformed the S&P 500 total-return index. The cumulative outcome is real, the starting line is favorable, and the structural argument for the reserve does not depend on the recent record. All three facts in writing.
Read the note - 02
Gold in an optimized portfolio.
A reading of what the long-run portfolio-efficiency research — Ibbotson Associates, the World Gold Council, Bridgewater — actually establishes about a small physical-gold allocation in a long-horizon portfolio. And what it does not.
Read the note - 03
Why central banks have been net buyers every year for more than a decade.
World Gold Council reserve data shows central banks in aggregate have purchased gold every year since 2010. The reasoning the institutions themselves give is structural — reserve diversification away from a single counterparty currency. The same reasoning applies, scaled down, to a household balance sheet.
Read the note - 04
The chain of claims, in detail.
An institutional read of the gold-ETF mechanism — what the trust holds, what the share represents, what the authorized-participant redemption structure does and does not guarantee. Every link is a counterparty. Every counterparty is a condition that has to remain true tomorrow.
Read the note - 05
Silver vs. gold in a reserve.
Two metals, two different jobs. Gold is the institutional reserve asset central banks hold; silver is a smaller, more volatile market with different industrial demand structure. The architectural reasoning for how they sit alongside each other in a private reserve is on the page.
Read the note - 06
What "allocated and segregated" actually means.
A structural distinction, not a marketing adjective. The contractual difference between specific bars designated to a client and a fractional claim against a pooled inventory determines what survives stress events — and what does not.
Read the note - 07
Reading the counterparty-chain signal.
A guide to the five public-facts dimensions tracked on the quarterly /signal page — ETF concentration, authorized-participant structure, central-bank purchasing, IMF COFER reserve composition, LBMA cleared-metal structure. What each one says structurally, and how to read it together.
Read the note
History and structure only. Sources named. Conclusions held to the data.