About The Gold Barometer

The Gold Barometer gives a daily reading of gold buying conditions on a scale from 0 to 100. Every reading is compared with every trading day since 1971. It is not a dealer. It is not an adviser. It is a measurement.

How to read the Barometer in 60 seconds

The score. One number between 0 and 100. Higher means today's buying conditions look better than most days since 1971. Lower means the opposite. The score blends seven parts, some counting more than others. The exact weights are on the method page.
The zones. We split 0 to 100 into five zones with fixed cutoffs. 0 to 19: Historically very unfavorable. 20 to 39: Unfavorable. 40 to 59: Mixed. 60 to 79: Favorable. 80 to 100: Historically very favorable. Each zone comes with what gold did next, since 1971.
The two hands. The brass hand is today's reading. The thin steel hand is where the reading stood a week ago. The gap between them is the recent trend. There is no third hand and no forecast.
Where the details live. Each of the seven parts has its own page: what it measures, how it is scored, the evidence for using it, and the caveats. The full history and the numbers for each zone are on the history page. The method page holds the formula, the change log, and the list of things we considered and left out.

Short glossary

Rank against its own past: We take today's value for a part. We compare it with every past value of the same part. That gives a number from 0 to 100. A part-score of 80 means today looks better than 80% of days for that part. We use this method so that different eras can be compared fairly.
Worst drop along the way: The biggest fall from a peak, in percent, inside a given time window. Take every one-year stretch in a zone since 1971 and find the worst drop inside each. We publish the middle result, and the same for five years. A favorable zone can still contain a painful drop along the way.
Spot: The current market price of one troy ounce of gold, in US dollars. The site shows a generic spot price from Metals.dev. We never show branded benchmark prices, such as LBMA or IBA rates. Spot is a price, not a signal. It only feeds the entry-price part, which compares today's price, after inflation, with its long-run average.
Premium: How much more a dealer charges for a coin or bar than the spot price of the metal in it. Rising premiums often signal that coins are hard to find or that dealers are running low. We only publish one number for the market as a whole. We never publish any dealer's prices.

Why it exists

People keep asking one question: "Is now the right time to buy gold?" The answer is not an opinion. It is a comparison against history. The Barometer builds that comparison from seven measured things. The formula, the archive and the record of where the framework has been wrong are all on this site. The answer arrives as an instrument reading, not an opinion piece.

How it is different from what is already out there

Most gold information today falls into three formats. Sentiment gauges publish a daily number, but not the weights, and rarely test it against history. Advice articles from banks, dealers and news outlets answer the question with words, not data. Price tickers show today's price without telling you what it means. Each has a use. None is a measurement.

The Barometer is designed to be a fourth format: a measurement. Concretely, that means:

A published formula. Seven numbered parts, weights, and a grade for how strong the evidence is behind each part, with primary sources linked.
A test back to 1971 that shows what gold did after each zone, including the times the framework was wrong.
A dated archive of every reading, copied daily to a public GitHub archive as a permanent record.
Our own retail premium data, which no dealer would publish, because a dealer cannot be neutral about its own margins.

Open the formula, the archive and the test, and judge for yourself. We link the formula, the archive, the test and this page, and let a reader judge.

Who runs it

Marc Pavageau, an independent publisher in France. He builds and maintains the instrument. He is a data publisher, not a financial adviser. No dealer, mint or broker pays for placement, and none of them takes part in the score. Contact: hello@thegoldbarometer.com.

How the site is paid for

The operator pays for it out of his own pocket. The site is neutral. No affiliate links here. No ads. No dealer sponsors. The email list is free and only sends you a note when the reading moves to a new zone. If any email ever contains an affiliate link, the top of the email will say so, as the US Federal Trade Commission asks.

How we stay neutral toward dealers

The retail premium part uses dealer prices from public product pages, once a day. We never republish any dealer's prices. We only publish one number for the market as a whole. If a dealer asks us to leave them out, we remove them from the basket. Dealer names appear only in the method and sources pages, as plain text, with no logos, under standard fair-use rules.

Common questions

Is The Gold Barometer a dealer or a broker?

No. This site sells nothing. There are no affiliate links on any page here. There are no ads. No dealer pays us. We are not a broker and not an investment adviser.

How is The Gold Barometer paid for?

The site is paid for by its operator. It has a free email list. You get a note only when the reading moves to a new zone. If an email ever contains a link that pays us when you buy, the top of the email will say so. US trade rules require it.

Who owns and runs The Gold Barometer?

Marc Pavageau, an independent publisher in France, with no dealer, mint or broker paying for placement and none of them involved in the score. He is a data publisher, not a financial adviser. What holds the reading up is not who writes it: the method is published in full and versioned. Every input is named with its source, and every change to a published reading is listed in the corrections log.

Contact

Email hello@thegoldbarometer.com. Press and data questions welcome. If you find a wrong number, please write in. Every correction lands on the corrections page with the date we received it.