Is gold worth buying? Returns and falls since 2000

Physical gold is worth buying as a smaller part of your wealth that you will hold for at least ten years. It is not worth it as a replacement for savings, for money you will need within a few years, or as a bet on a quick price rise. Since 2000 gold has risen by about 10% a year on average in euros, but along the way it also lost more than a third of its value and took almost seven years to recover.

For this article we used daily gold prices since 2000 to check what gold returned, how deep it fell, how long you had to hold it and how it did against stocks. All figures are in euros, based on COMEX closing prices converted at the ECB rate, up to early October 2026.

What gold has returned

In early October 2026 gold cost about €3,700 per ounce, or about €120 per gram. Today’s price is shown at the top of the gold and silver calculator.

The last three years were exceptional. The 15-year view shows the other side: someone who bought gold in autumn 2011 has made 7.8% a year on average to date, because they bought close to the peak at the time. With gold, when you buy matters a lot.

Gold pays no interest or dividends. All of the return comes from the price change. That is the main difference from a deposit, which pays you interest for certain, and from an equity ETF, which is backed by company profits.

How gold moved year by year

In 25 years gold ended the year with a loss five times. Four of those losses were small, a couple of percent at most, and in 2015 and 2017 under 1%. One was large: in 2013 gold fell 31%.

How deep gold falls

The longest slump in this period started in October 2012 at about €1,385 per ounce. By the end of 2013 gold had lost 37% of its value. It only got back to that level in August 2019, almost seven years after the peak. Someone who bought at the top waited seven years just to break even.

The other big falls were shorter:

Gold hit its record on 2 March 2026 at about €4,540 per ounce. By mid-July it had fallen 23%, and in early October it was still about a fifth below the peak. So the price of gold can drop quickly too.

Before 2000 it was worse. Someone who bought gold at the peak in January 1980 waited until 2008 in dollar terms to recover, almost 28 years. Our data starts in 2000, when gold was cheap, so the picture since then looks better than the long-run average.

How long you need to hold gold

Because the price swings so much, we checked every period since 2000: what you would have got if you bought gold on any day and sold it after one, three, five or ten years. We allowed about 4% for buying and selling, which is roughly the gap between the buy and sell price on a one-ounce bar.

Over one year the buyer was at a loss in one case out of three. Over ten years, in this period, never. That is no guarantee for the future, but it shows clearly that gold is a long-term investment. Money you will need for a car, a home deposit or unexpected costs belongs in a deposit or a savings account.

Gold or stocks

Our data on a global equity ETF (iShares Core MSCI World, in euros) starts in September 2009. Over the same period gold returned 10.5% a year and the equity ETF 12.6%. The gap looks small, but over 17 years it adds up: €10,000 in gold became about €55,000, in the equity ETF about €76,000.

Gold plays a different role, though. It often holds up when stocks fall:

The last row shows that this does not always hold. In 2013 gold fell while stocks rose. So gold is not insurance that always works, but an investment that moves differently from stocks. How both would have done with the same monthly amount is shown in the gold, deposit and ETF comparison.

What buying and selling costs

In Slovenia investment gold is VAT-free, and if you sell it at a profit as a private individual you pay no income tax. The cost is the gap between the buy and sell price. On a one-ounce bar it is about 3 to 5%, on 1 g bars it can be as much as 20%. Gold first has to rise by that percentage before you break even.

Which size to buy, where, and where to keep it is covered in our article on buying investment gold. If you are choosing between a bar and a gold ETF, the biggest difference is tax: physical gold is tax-free when sold, while gains on an ETF are taxed for up to 15 years.

Where to buy physical gold

In Slovenia physical investment gold is sold by specialised precious metal dealers, in shops and online. Before you buy, check that the dealer clearly publishes its buy and sell prices, what a gram costs for the product you want, and whether it also buys gold back. Compare prices at two or three dealers, as the same bar can differ by one or two percent, and coins and smaller bars by more.

Don’t buy gold from unknown sellers on classifieds or social media. Fakes with a tungsten core (tungsten is a metal almost as dense as gold, so such a fake weighs the same as a real bar) are good enough that you can’t spot them without equipment. A detailed list of what to look for in a dealer, and how a purchase works, is in our article on buying investment gold.

One of the providers is Elementum, a FinPortal.si partner we work with through their ambassador programme. Its online shop sells gold and silver bars and coins, sent to you as an insured parcel or collected at their office. It buys back Umicore bars at 1.1% below the market price. If you would like their offer, send them an inquiry.

When gold makes sense and when it doesn’t

Mojca and Peter have €40,000 in savings. An emergency fund covering six months of expenses sits in a deposit, and they invest in an equity ETF every month. They buy a one-ounce bar for about €3,800, just under a tenth of their investments. If stocks fall, the gold will probably soften the loss. If gold alone falls by a third, they lose about €1,300, which does not throw them off course. They do not plan to sell the gold for at least ten years.

Luka has €3,000 in his account and no other reserve. After the news about record prices he would put all of it into 1 g bars. For €3,000 he would get about 22 grams, because the premium on such small pieces is 10 to 15%. If in six months he needed the money to repair his car, he would sell the gold at a loss even if the price had not fallen. For him an emergency fund in a deposit comes first.

In short:

• It makes sense if you have an emergency fund, gold is at most about 10% of your investments, you buy larger bars or coins and you will hold it for ten years or more.
• It doesn’t make sense for money you will need within a few years, if you are buying because the price is in the news, or if you would buy lots of small bars.

If you don’t want to guess whether the price is too high, buy gradually. Buying smaller amounts every month or quarter means you pay the average price. How this works and what it costs is explained in our article on saving in gold and silver. It also helps to be aware in advance of how emotions affect decisions, covered in our article on the psychology of investing.

And silver?

Silver swings even more than gold, because the market is smaller and industry uses a lot of it. When you buy physical silver in Slovenia you also pay 22% VAT, so together with the premium silver has to rise by about a quarter before you break even. For most people silver is at most a small addition to gold.

Check with your own numbers

Enter your monthly amount and period in the gold and silver calculator. It uses actual historical prices, so you also see the weaker years, not just averages. If you are still deciding whether to save or invest at all, start with our article on saving or investing.

Past returns do not guarantee future returns. This article is not investment advice.