IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/kap/rqfnac/v51y2018i2d10.1007_s11156-017-0672-7.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Is gold a hedge against inflation? A wavelet time-scale perspective

Author

Listed:
  • Thomas Conlon

    (University College Dublin)

  • Brian M. Lucey

    (Trinity College)

  • Gazi Salah Uddin

    (Linköping University)

Abstract

Among the many presumed characteristics of gold, the ability to act as an enduring store of value is frequently noted. In this paper, the ability of gold to dynamically hedge against inflation is examined for various holding periods using the continuous wavelet transformation. Gold is first established as both a short- and long-term hedge against realized inflation for a number of developed economies. Dynamic analysis demonstrates that these hedging properties are not limited to a single historical cohort. Next, gold is shown to comove with unexpected inflation across all countries examined, albeit with some variation in the direction of the relationship. Finally, the capacity of both gold futures and gold stocks to act as a hedge against inflation is demonstrated.

Suggested Citation

  • Thomas Conlon & Brian M. Lucey & Gazi Salah Uddin, 2018. "Is gold a hedge against inflation? A wavelet time-scale perspective," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 51(2), pages 317-345, August.
    • Handle: RePEc:kap:rqfnac:v:51:y:2018:i:2:d:10.1007_s11156-017-0672-7
    DOI: 10.1007/s11156-017-0672-7
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s11156-017-0672-7
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s11156-017-0672-7?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Blose, Laurence E., 2010. "Gold prices, cost of carry, and expected inflation," Journal of Economics and Business, Elsevier, vol. 62(1), pages 35-47, January.
    2. Reboredo, Juan C., 2013. "Is gold a safe haven or a hedge for the US dollar? Implications for risk management," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 37(8), pages 2665-2676.
    3. Martin Feldstein, 1983. "Inflation, Tax Rules, and the Prices of Land and Gold," NBER Chapters, in: Inflation, Tax Rules, and Capital Formation, pages 221-228, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    4. Thomas Conlon & John Cotter, 2012. "An empirical analysis of dynamic multiscale hedging using wavelet decomposition," Journal of Futures Markets, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 32(3), pages 272-299, March.
    5. Vacha, Lukas & Barunik, Jozef, 2012. "Co-movement of energy commodities revisited: Evidence from wavelet coherence analysis," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 34(1), pages 241-247.
    6. Solnik, Bruno, 1983. "The Relation between Stock Prices and Inflationary Expectations: The International Evidence," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 38(1), pages 35-48, March.
    7. Baur, Dirk G. & McDermott, Thomas K., 2010. "Is gold a safe haven? International evidence," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 34(8), pages 1886-1898, August.
    8. Stephen G. Cecchetti & Rita S. Chu & Charles Steindel, 2000. "The unreliability of inflation indicators," Current Issues in Economics and Finance, Federal Reserve Bank of New York, vol. 6(Apr).
    9. Michis, Antonis A., 2014. "Investing in gold: Individual asset risk in the long run," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 11(4), pages 369-374.
    10. Wang, Kuan-Min & Lee, Yuan-Ming & Thi, Thanh-Binh Nguyen, 2011. "Time and place where gold acts as an inflation hedge: An application of long-run and short-run threshold model," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 28(3), pages 806-819, May.
    11. Dirk G. Baur & Brian M. Lucey, 2010. "Is Gold a Hedge or a Safe Haven? An Analysis of Stocks, Bonds and Gold," The Financial Review, Eastern Finance Association, vol. 45(2), pages 217-229, May.
    12. Antonello D'Agostino & Paolo Surico, 2009. "Does Global Liquidity Help to Forecast U.S. Inflation?," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 41(2-3), pages 479-489, March.
    13. Beckmann, Joscha & Czudaj, Robert, 2013. "Gold as an inflation hedge in a time-varying coefficient framework," The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 24(C), pages 208-222.
    14. Nicholas Taylor, 1998. "Precious metals and inflation," Applied Financial Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 8(2), pages 201-210.
    15. Rua, António & Nunes, Luís C., 2009. "International comovement of stock market returns: A wavelet analysis," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 16(4), pages 632-639, September.
    16. Bekiros Stelios & Nguyen Duc Khuong & Uddin Gazi Salah & Sjö Bo, 2015. "Business cycle (de)synchronization in the aftermath of the global financial crisis: implications for the Euro area," Studies in Nonlinear Dynamics & Econometrics, De Gruyter, vol. 19(5), pages 609-624, December.
    17. Conlon, Thomas & Cotter, John, 2013. "Downside risk and the energy hedger's horizon," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 36(C), pages 371-379.
    18. Sjaastad, Larry A., 2008. "The price of gold and the exchange rates: Once again," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 33(2), pages 118-124, June.
    19. Ang, Andrew & Bekaert, Geert & Wei, Min, 2007. "Do macro variables, asset markets, or surveys forecast inflation better?," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 54(4), pages 1163-1212, May.
    20. Bharat Kolluri & Mahmoud Wahab, 2008. "Stock returns and expected inflation: evidence from an asymmetric test specification," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 30(4), pages 371-395, May.
    21. Brian M. Lucey & Charles Larkin & Fergal O'Connor, 2014. "Gold markets around the world - who spills over what, to whom, when?," Applied Economics Letters, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 21(13), pages 887-892, September.
    22. Reboredo, Juan C. & Rivera-Castro, Miguel A., 2014. "Gold and exchange rates: Downside risk and hedging at different investment horizons," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 34(C), pages 267-279.
    23. Rua, António, 2010. "Measuring comovement in the time-frequency space," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 32(2), pages 685-691, June.
    24. Brian Lucey & Fergal O’connor, 2017. "Are gold bugs coherent?," Applied Economics Letters, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 24(2), pages 90-94, January.
    25. Chen, Shiu-Sheng, 2009. "Oil price pass-through into inflation," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 31(1), pages 126-133, January.
    26. Brian M. Lucey & Charles Larkin & Fergal A. O'Connor, 2013. "London or New York: where and when does the gold price originate?," Applied Economics Letters, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 20(8), pages 813-817, May.
    27. Claude B. Erb & Campbell R. Harvey, 2013. "The Golden Dilemma," NBER Working Papers 18706, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    28. Gerlach, Stefan & Svensson, Lars E. O., 2003. "Money and inflation in the euro area: A case for monetary indicators?," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 50(8), pages 1649-1672, November.
    29. Batten, Jonathan A. & Ciner, Cetin & Lucey, Brian M, 2014. "On the economic determinants of the gold–inflation relation," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 41(C), pages 101-108.
    30. Aguiar-Conraria, Luís & Martins, Manuel M.F. & Soares, Maria Joana, 2012. "The yield curve and the macro-economy across time and frequencies," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 36(12), pages 1950-1970.
    31. Schotman, Peter C. & Schweitzer, Mark, 2000. "Horizon sensitivity of the inflation hedge of stocks," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 7(3-4), pages 301-315, November.
    32. Thomas Conlon & John Cotter & Ramazan Gençay, 2016. "Commodity futures hedging, risk aversion and the hedging horizon," The European Journal of Finance, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 22(15), pages 1534-1560, December.
    33. Bampinas, Georgios & Panagiotidis, Theodore, 2015. "Are gold and silver a hedge against inflation? A two century perspective," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 41(C), pages 267-276.
    34. Faria, João Ricardo & McAdam, Peter, 2012. "A new perspective on the Gold Standard: Inflation as a population phenomenon," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 31(6), pages 1358-1370.
    35. Jin-Ray Lu & Chih-Ming Chan, 2014. "Optimal portfolio choice of gold assets in the differential market and differential game structures," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 42(2), pages 309-325, February.
    36. Fernandez, Viviana, 2006. "The CAPM and value at risk at different time-scales," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 15(3), pages 203-219.
    37. Michael Graham & Jarno Kiviaho & Jussi Nikkinen, 2013. "Short-term and long-term dependencies of the S&P 500 index and commodity prices," Quantitative Finance, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 13(4), pages 583-592, March.
    38. A. Malliaris & Mary Malliaris, 2013. "Are oil, gold and the euro inter-related? Time series and neural network analysis," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 40(1), pages 1-14, January.
    39. Greg Tkacz, 2007. "Gold Prices and Inflation," Staff Working Papers 07-35, Bank of Canada.
    40. Martin Hauptfleisch & Tālis J. Putniņš & Brian Lucey, 2016. "Who Sets the Price of Gold? London or New York," Journal of Futures Markets, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 36(6), pages 564-586, June.
    41. Zvi Bodie, 1979. "Inflation Risk and Capital Market Equilibrium," NBER Working Papers 0373, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    42. Kim, Sangbae & In, Francis, 2005. "The relationship between stock returns and inflation: new evidence from wavelet analysis," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 12(3), pages 435-444, June.
    43. Fama, Eugene F. & Schwert, G. William, 1977. "Asset returns and inflation," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 5(2), pages 115-146, November.
    44. Viviana Fernandez, 2008. "Multi‐period hedge ratios for a multi‐asset portfolio when accounting for returns co‐movement," Journal of Futures Markets, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 28(2), pages 182-207, February.
    45. Funashima, Yoshito, 2017. "Time-varying leads and lags across frequencies using a continuous wavelet transform approach," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 60(C), pages 24-28.
    46. António Rua, 2012. "Money Growth and Inflation in the Euro Area: A Time-Frequency View," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 74(6), pages 875-885, December.
    47. Bekiros, Stelios & Nguyen, Duc Khuong & Uddin, Gazi Salah & Sjö, Bo, 2016. "On the time scale behavior of equity-commodity links: Implications for portfolio management," Journal of International Financial Markets, Institutions and Money, Elsevier, vol. 41(C), pages 30-46.
    48. Madaleno, Mara & Pinho, Carlos, 2014. "Wavelet dynamics for oil-stock world interactions," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 45(C), pages 120-133.
    49. Bredin, Don & Conlon, Thomas & Potì, Valerio, 2015. "Does gold glitter in the long-run? Gold as a hedge and safe haven across time and investment horizon," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 41(C), pages 320-328.
    50. Neill Fortune, J., 1987. "The inflation rate of the price of gold, expected prices and interest rates," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 9(1), pages 71-82.
    51. Luís Aguiar-Conraria & Maria Joana Soares, 2014. "The Continuous Wavelet Transform: Moving Beyond Uni- And Bivariate Analysis," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 28(2), pages 344-375, April.
    52. Gencay, Ramazan & Selcuk, Faruk & Whitcher, Brandon, 2005. "Multiscale systematic risk," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 24(1), pages 55-70, February.
    53. Gençay, Ramazan & Gençay, Ramazan & Selçuk, Faruk & Whitcher, Brandon J., 2001. "An Introduction to Wavelets and Other Filtering Methods in Finance and Economics," Elsevier Monographs, Elsevier, edition 1, number 9780122796708.
    54. Michael Graham & Jussi Nikkinen, 2011. "Co-movement of the Finnish and international stock markets: a wavelet analysis," The European Journal of Finance, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 17(5-6), pages 409-425.
    55. Keshab Shrestha & Kok Tan, 2005. "Real Interest Rate Parity: Long-Run and Short-Run Analysis Using Wavelets," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 25(2), pages 139-157, September.
    56. Lin, Fu-Lai & Chen, Yu-Fen & Yang, Sheng-Yung, 2016. "Does the value of US dollar matter with the price of oil and gold? A dynamic analysis from time–frequency space," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 43(C), pages 59-71.
    57. Bredin, Don & Conlon, Thomas & Potì, Valerio, 2017. "The price of shelter - Downside risk reduction with precious metals," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 49(C), pages 48-58.
    58. Ftiti, Zied & Guesmi, Khaled & Abid, Ilyes, 2016. "Oil price and stock market co-movement: What can we learn from time-scale approaches?," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 46(C), pages 266-280.
    59. Capie, Forrest & Mills, Terence C. & Wood, Geoffrey, 2005. "Gold as a hedge against the dollar," Journal of International Financial Markets, Institutions and Money, Elsevier, vol. 15(4), pages 343-352, October.
    60. Boudoukh, Jacob & Richardson, Matthew, 1993. "Stock Returns and Inflation: A Long-Horizon Perspective," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 83(5), pages 1346-1355, December.
    61. Stephen X. H. Gong & Michael Firth & Kevin Cullinane, 2006. "Beta Estimation and Stability in the US-Listed International Transportation Industry," Review of Pacific Basin Financial Markets and Policies (RPBFMP), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 9(03), pages 463-490.
    62. Aviral K. Tiwari & Claudiu T. Albulescu & Rangan Gupta, 2016. "Time-frequency relationship between US output with commodity and asset prices," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 48(3), pages 227-242, January.
    63. Nikolay Gospodinov & Serena Ng, 2013. "Commodity Prices, Convenience Yields, and Inflation," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 95(1), pages 206-219, March.
    64. Osamah M. Al-Khazali & Chong Soo Pyun, 2004. "Stock Prices and Inflation: New Evidence from the Pacific-Basin Countries," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 22(2), pages 123-140, March.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Bredin, Don & Conlon, Thomas & Potì, Valerio, 2015. "Does gold glitter in the long-run? Gold as a hedge and safe haven across time and investment horizon," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 41(C), pages 320-328.
    2. O'Connor, Fergal A. & Lucey, Brian M. & Batten, Jonathan A. & Baur, Dirk G., 2015. "The financial economics of gold — A survey," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 41(C), pages 186-205.
    3. Thi Hong Van Hoang & Amine Lahiani & David Heller, 2016. "Is gold a hedge against inflation? New evidence from a nonlinear ARDL approach," Post-Print hal-02012307, HAL.
    4. Hoang, Thi Hong Van & Lahiani, Amine & Heller, David, 2016. "Is gold a hedge against inflation? New evidence from a nonlinear ARDL approach," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 54(C), pages 54-66.
    5. Lucey, Brian M. & Sharma, Susan Sunila & Vigne, Samuel A., 2017. "Gold and inflation(s) – A time-varying relationship," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 67(C), pages 88-101.
    6. Qureshi, Saba & Rehman, Ijaz Ur & Qureshi, Fiza, 2018. "Does gold act as a safe haven against exchange rate fluctuations? The case of Pakistan rupee," Journal of Policy Modeling, Elsevier, vol. 40(4), pages 685-708.
    7. Bredin, Don & Conlon, Thomas & Potì, Valerio, 2017. "The price of shelter - Downside risk reduction with precious metals," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 49(C), pages 48-58.
    8. Zhu, Yanhui & Fan, Jingwen & Tucker, Jon, 2018. "The impact of monetary policy on gold price dynamics," Research in International Business and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 44(C), pages 319-331.
    9. Dar, Arif Billah & Bhanja, Niyati & Paul, Manas, 2019. "Do gold mining stocks behave like gold or equities? Evidence from the UK and the US," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 59(C), pages 369-384.
    10. Lin, Fu-Lai & Chen, Yu-Fen & Yang, Sheng-Yung, 2016. "Does the value of US dollar matter with the price of oil and gold? A dynamic analysis from time–frequency space," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 43(C), pages 59-71.
    11. Wang, Xinya & Lucey, Brian & Huang, Shupei, 2022. "Can gold hedge against oil price movements: Evidence from GARCH-EVT wavelet modeling," Journal of Commodity Markets, Elsevier, vol. 27(C).
    12. Baruník, Jozef & Kočenda, Evžen & Vácha, Lukáš, 2016. "Gold, oil, and stocks: Dynamic correlations," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 42(C), pages 186-201.
    13. Semeyutin, Artur & Downing, Gareth, 2022. "Co-jumps in the U.S. interest rates and precious metals markets and their implications for investors," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 81(C).
    14. Arnold, Stephan & Auer, Benjamin R., 2015. "What do scientists know about inflation hedging?," The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 34(C), pages 187-214.
    15. Hoang, Thi-Hong-Van & Wong, Wing-Keung & Zhu, Zhenzhen, 2015. "Is gold different for risk-averse and risk-seeking investors? An empirical analysis of the Shanghai Gold Exchange," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 50(C), pages 200-211.
    16. Beckmann, Joscha & Czudaj, Robert, 2013. "Gold as an inflation hedge in a time-varying coefficient framework," The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 24(C), pages 208-222.
    17. Dichtl, Hubert, 2020. "Forecasting excess returns of the gold market: Can we learn from stock market predictions?," Journal of Commodity Markets, Elsevier, vol. 19(C).
    18. Reboredo, Juan C. & Rivera-Castro, Miguel A., 2014. "Gold and exchange rates: Downside risk and hedging at different investment horizons," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 34(C), pages 267-279.
    19. Huang, Xiaoyong & Jia, Fei & Xu, Xiangyun & Yu shi,, 2019. "The threshold effect of market sentiment and inflation expectations on gold price," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 62(C), pages 77-83.
    20. Shubhasis Dey, 2016. "Historical Events and the Gold Price," Working papers 198, Indian Institute of Management Kozhikode.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Gold; Inflation; Hedge; Horizon;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • E30 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - General (includes Measurement and Data)
    • E31 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - Price Level; Inflation; Deflation
    • G10 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - General (includes Measurement and Data)
    • G11 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Portfolio Choice; Investment Decisions

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:kap:rqfnac:v:51:y:2018:i:2:d:10.1007_s11156-017-0672-7. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.