What information can you glean from an assessment of the fluctuating price of gold? While it might lead you to say that markets are a bit steadier than they were a few years ago because gold is now increasing at a steady but slower rate, it also means something else. The price for gold shows that economic recovery is going to be a bit different than what the world has previously experienced.

How can the price of gold tell us that much? If you look at the recent history of prices for pure gold assets, you would see that it behaved in a similar manner to the other precious metals at the first signs of the many recent economic crises. That is, it rose quite a bit in 2008 before dropping substantially in early 2009. The price of gold has, since that time, steadily increased in value.

In fact, the current prices for gold are at unprecedented levels. So, we can see that many investors rushed to gold as a safe haven asset when the global mortgage crisis began. Things took a unique turn, however, when industry, manufacturing and production declined in the face of the world’s subsequent economic problems. This meant that everything from automobile production to mining operations came to a near standstill. This accounts for the decline in values immediately after the first rush to investment.

We can now look at the way gold has behaved in order to see how the current market conditions are radically different from almost any other point in history. This is because gold did not just return to its pre-crisis prices, but has almost tripled since 2006. We can use that simple fact to recognize that investors are still using gold as a safe haven even as industry and manufacturing seems to be getting more active and “back to normal”.

 Why would investors choose to do that? If you consider that the once traditional investment vehicles such as stocks and securities are no longer viewed as an ideal or feasible investment option, it begins to explain why gold prices are still climbing. If you also understand that the different “aftershock” effects such as inflation, the declining value of the dollar, and the turbulence in some of the world’s major economic systems has led to serious risk in terms of other investment options, it is easy to understand how and why the price of gold is going to continue to rise indefinitely.