I see some people saying, “it’s not gold going up, it’s the dollar going down” and things like that.

That’s not really the case, and there’s a simple test to see why.

When a currency crashes, it loses value relative to everything. Other currencies, real estate, stocks, precious metals, etc. Prices of normal goods and services skyrocket.

In this bull run, precious metals gained value vs other things. Gold vs oil. Gold vs stocks. Gold vs real estate. Silver vs oil, etc.

The dollar is rangebound vs other major currencies. The supply growth of the dollar this past year was 5%. It’s gold and other precious metals that went up vs everything. Partly based on fundamentals, and now seemingly due to momentum.

Now, where there is some truth to the statement: central banks in aggregate haven’t added to their holding of treasuries in ten years. The only foreign treasury purchases have been in the private sector, and at a rate lower than total US debt growth. But central banks have been buying gold. There is indeed a gradual shift toward neutral reserve assets afoot, ever since around 2009.

But that a very long process. That source of demand didn’t single-handedly drive the huge boom in precious metals over this past year. This was like a volleyball held under water and let go, soaring back up.

As part of our currently nightly movie streak, we watched One Battle After Another.

Dicaprio, Penn, Del Toro, etc. A (very long) dark comedy-thriller about far-left terrorists and white supremacists.

Neither me nor my husband were a fan of this one at all.

-Didn't like or sympathize with almost any character (other than the teenager).

-But I also didn't find it that funny or interesting, and no character really captured a scene.

In a movie like No Country for Old Men, I didn't particularly get emotionally attached to any character either, but they're all super interesting on-screen, especially the villain. Penn plays a villain here (Colonel Lockjaw) that is both menacing and goofy, but while the writing and acting of Hans Landa in Inglorious Bastards really nails that combo, I didn't feel that way for Lockjaw. It was more jarring.

Overall acting was fine, given the quality of the actors. But no role was particularly memorable. Nothing really stood out for the cinematography or the musical score, and I didn't particularly like the writing. And several aspects seemed unrealistic in what feels like it's trying to be a fairly realistic movie.

I suspect the main issue is that on one hand, they want to capture that kind of dark-funny nihilistic vibe that several Coen brothers movies have (e.g. Fargo). But they don't quite want to fully commit to that nihilism either, and instead really do want us to emotionally attach to several of the characters here, and straddling that line didn't work for me.