22 July 1944: Bretton Woods rebuilds the money system
Delegates from 44 Allied nations wrapped up the Bretton Woods conference in New Hampshire with an agreement for the postwar monetary order. Currencies would be pegged to the US dollar, and the dollar would be convertible to gold at $35 an ounce. The deal also created the IMF and the World Bank. It brought decades of relative stability, until the US ran out of patience with the gold link in 1971.
The lesson: Monetary systems last only as long as the promises behind them stay affordable to keep.
What it meant for investors
$1,000 in Gold (oz) at the start of 1990 → $10,500 today, vs $19,429 in the S&P 500.
We start the clock at the start of 1990, the first year in our price data after the event. That is 10.5 times the money, but $8,929 less than a plain index fund made over the same years.
What Gold (oz) teaches: Gold pays no income, so its returns arrive in rare bursts separated by long droughts; it took almost three decades to regain its 1980 nominal high.
| Bought in | Price then | Worth today | S&P 500 would be |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1990 | $400 | $10,500 | $19,429 |
| 1995 | $385 | $10,909 | $14,783 |
| 2000 | $290 | $14,483 | $4,626 |
green = beat the S&P 500 · red = lost money
What if you bought Gold (oz)? Every starting year and the full story →
More Gold (oz) history
- 21 January 1980: Gold spikes to $850 an ounce
- 17 March 1968: The gold pool collapses
- 5 April 1933: FDR orders Americans to hand in their gold
- 20 June 2013: Gold sinks below $1,300 after the Fed's taper talk
- 15 August 1971: Nixon closes the gold window
- 24 September 1869: Black Friday: the great gold corner collapses
Could you have called it at the time? The wheel picks the year, you pick the position, ten seconds a pick.
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