Gold Prices Surge 14% in August, Best Month Since 2008
Gold prices have been on a tear over the last year, gaining 37.1%. However, in the six months leading up to July, the price of gold slid to around $4,000 per ounce. But gold has staged a big comeback over the last month with August looking to be the best month for the yellow metal since 2008. Gold is up 14% over the last month and year-to-date, it is now up 7.4%. The price of gold is currently trading around $4,700 per ounce.
Investors can buy physical gold through jewelry, coins, and gold bars or through various gold ETFs that are benchmarked to the physical gold price. One popular gold ETF is SPDR Gold Shares (GLD), which has an expense ratio of 0.4% and $130.3 billion in net assets.
Another option for investors is to buy the stocks of gold mining companies, such as VanEck Gold Miners ETF (GDX) or Newmont Corp. (NEM). GDX has 64 holdings with its two largest holdings being Agnico Eagle Mines at 10.77% and Newmont at 10.73%. GDX is up 37% over the last month, while NEM is up 42.5%