The Archive
27 long-form pieces across history, markets, industry, craft, mining and science. Filter by desk, re-sort, or search the full text of every issue.
Science
For two thousand years, making gold was the definition of a fool's errand. Physicists can now do it — in particle colliders, in reactors, and soon, some start-ups claim, as a by-product of fusion power. What follows is a sober look at what synthetic gold really is, what it costs, and whether it could ever unsettle a market built on the idea that gold cannot be made.
3 November 2026 · 25 min read
Markets
Governments report holding roughly 36,000 tonnes of gold — a figure quoted everywhere and verified almost nowhere. Between the published number and the physical bar sits a chain of certificates, custodians and fifty-year-old count sheets. This is an attempt to walk that chain honestly.
11 September 2026 · 22 min read
Markets
For two decades the gold price could be read off an inflation-linked bond screen. Then, somewhere after 2022, the relationship stopped behaving — and the argument about why has become the most consequential debate in the metal's market.
8 September 2026 · 25 min read
Industry
Somewhere between a mine's doré bar and a Good Delivery brick sits a chain of chlorination furnaces, electrolytic cells, assay labs and accreditation committees that decides which gold the world's markets will accept without question — and which gold gets quietly refused.
20 August 2026 · 17 min read
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