If you stop measuring the U.S. stock market in dollars and measure it in gold, the picture changes completely.
In gold terms, U.S. equities haven’t been compounding wealth they’ve been losing purchasing power. The apparent “all-time highs” are largely a reflection of dollar debasement, not real value creation. Gold doesn’t care about rate cuts, earnings narratives, or CPI optics. It measures truth in scarcity.
This is why long-cycle investors track stocks priced in hard assets, not fiat. When stocks rise but gold rises faster, real wealth is quietly rotating not growing.
Nominal gains can be comforting.
Real gains are what survive monetary regimes.