IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ces/ceswps/_9662.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

How Money Relates to Value? An Empirical Examination on Gold, Silver and Bitcoin

Author

Listed:
  • José Alves
  • João Quental Gonçalves

Abstract

The present work offers a review on two divergent schools of thought regarding the subject of money and highlights why understanding it is important to grasp the workings and nature of the concept of money. We adopt a spontaneous order perspective on social institutions, considering money as one. Such framework allows for the construction of axioms from which we formulate our problem allowing us to ask how old forms of money such as Gold and Silver hold up in today’s world regarding their hedging properties. Moreover, we also do so for Bitcoin since we consider it an appropriate asset due to its specific characteristics and its (at the time of writing) more than 10-year life span. We resort to the Autoregressive Distributed Lag (ARDL) methodology in order to study our three assets in the context of the US dollar and the US Economy for two different time periods. We analyse price dynamics from 1980 to 2020 for gold and silver resorting to annual data. Regarding bitcoin we employ quarterly data from 2009 to 2020. We conclude that the theories that explain what money is, how it comes to be so and how certain types of “money assets” may serve both as an indirect hedge against inflation in the two interpretations of the word and as a “stock of value” have merits that might deserve further investigation. .

Suggested Citation

  • José Alves & João Quental Gonçalves, 2022. "How Money Relates to Value? An Empirical Examination on Gold, Silver and Bitcoin," CESifo Working Paper Series 9662, CESifo.
    • Handle: RePEc:ces:ceswps:_9662
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.cesifo.org/DocDL/cesifo1_wp9662.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Schilling, Linda & Uhlig, Harald, 2019. "Some simple bitcoin economics," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 106(C), pages 16-26.
    2. 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.
    3. L. Randall Wray, 2024. "Modern Money Theory," Springer Books, Springer, edition 3, number 978-3-031-47884-0, April.
    4. Engle, Robert & Granger, Clive, 2015. "Co-integration and error correction: Representation, estimation, and testing," Applied Econometrics, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration (RANEPA), vol. 39(3), pages 106-135.
    5. José Alves & Tomás Silva, 2021. "An Empirical Assessment of Monetary Policy Channels in Income and Wealth Disparities," Comparative Economic Studies, Palgrave Macmillan;Association for Comparative Economic Studies, vol. 63(3), pages 432-449, September.
    6. Pesaran, M.H. & Shin, Y., 1995. "An Autoregressive Distributed Lag Modelling Approach to Cointegration Analysis," Cambridge Working Papers in Economics 9514, Faculty of Economics, University of Cambridge.
    7. Serena Ng & Pierre Perron, 2001. "LAG Length Selection and the Construction of Unit Root Tests with Good Size and Power," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 69(6), pages 1519-1554, November.
    8. Saikkonen, Pentti & Lütkepohl, Helmut, 2000. "Testing For The Cointegrating Rank Of A Var Process With An Intercept," Econometric Theory, Cambridge University Press, vol. 16(3), pages 373-406, June.
    9. 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.
    10. Ammous, Saifedean, 2018. "Can cryptocurrencies fulfil the functions of money?," The Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 70(C), pages 38-51.
    11. Martin Feldstein, 1983. "Inflation, Tax Rules, and the Stock Market," NBER Chapters, in: Inflation, Tax Rules, and Capital Formation, pages 199-220, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    12. D. R. Anderson & K. P. Burnham & G. C. White, 1998. "Comparison of Akaike information criterion and consistent Akaike information criterion for model selection and statistical inference from capture-recapture studies," Journal of Applied Statistics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 25(2), pages 263-282.
    13. Durnin, Brian, 2017. "James M. Buchanan: Neoclassical, Austrian, Neither, or Both?," MPRA Paper 89629, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    14. Lutkepohl, Helmut & Saikkonen, Pentti, 2000. "Testing for the cointegrating rank of a VAR process with a time trend," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 95(1), pages 177-198, March.
    15. 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.
    16. Michael D. Bordo & John Landon Lane & Angela Redish, 2004. "Good versus Bad Deflation: Lessons from the Gold Standard Era," NBER Working Papers 10329, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    17. Kiyotaki, Nobuhiro & Wright, Randall, 1991. "A contribution to the pure theory of money," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 53(2), pages 215-235, April.
    18. Martin Feldstein, 1983. "Inflation and the Stock Market," NBER Chapters, in: Inflation, Tax Rules, and Capital Formation, pages 186-198, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    19. Bilgin, Mehmet Huseyin & Gogolin, Fabian & Lau, Marco Chi Keung & Vigne, Samuel A., 2018. "Time-variation in the relationship between white precious metals and inflation: A cross-country analysis," Journal of International Financial Markets, Institutions and Money, Elsevier, vol. 56(C), pages 55-70.
    20. Fama, Eugene F, 1981. "Stock Returns, Real Activity, Inflation, and Money," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 71(4), pages 545-565, September.
    21. Vigne, Samuel A. & Lucey, Brian M. & O’Connor, Fergal A. & Yarovaya, Larisa, 2017. "The financial economics of white precious metals — A survey," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 52(C), pages 292-308.
    22. Alina Iancu & Gareth Anderson & Sakai Ando & Ethan Boswell & Andrea Gamba & Shushanik Hakobyan & Lusine Lusinyan & Neil Meads & Yiqun Wu, 2022. "Reserve Currencies in an Evolving International Monetary System," Open Economies Review, Springer, vol. 33(5), pages 879-915, November.
    23. Saikkonen, Pentti & Lutkepohl, Helmut, 2000. "Testing for the Cointegrating Rank of a VAR Process with Structural Shifts," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 18(4), pages 451-464, October.
    24. Bodie, Zvi, 1976. "Common Stocks as a Hedge against Inflation," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 31(2), pages 459-470, May.
    25. Stefano Battilossi & Youssef Cassis & Kazuhiko Yago (ed.), 2020. "Handbook of the History of Money and Currency," Springer Books, Springer, number 978-981-13-0596-2, April.
    26. Laurence S. Moss, 2010. "Carl Menger's Theory of Exchange," American Journal of Economics and Sociology, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 69(1), pages 266-289, January.
    27. Lei Lv & Zhixin Liu & Yingying Xu, 2019. "Technological progress, globalization and low-inflation: Evidence from the United States," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 14(4), pages 1-19, April.
    28. M. Hashem Pesaran & Yongcheol Shin & Richard J. Smith, 2001. "Bounds testing approaches to the analysis of level relationships," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 16(3), pages 289-326.
    29. Banerjee, Anindya, et al, 1986. "Exploring Equilibrium Relationships in Econometrics through Static Models: Some Monte Carlo Evidence," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 48(3), pages 253-277, August.
    30. Michael Murach, 2019. "Global Determinants of the Gold Price: A Multivariate Cointegration Analysis," Scottish Journal of Political Economy, Scottish Economic Society, vol. 66(1), pages 198-214, February.
    31. Geske, Robert & Roll, Richard, 1983. "The Fiscal and Monetary Linkage between Stock Returns and Inflation," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 38(1), pages 1-33, March.
    32. Feldstein, Martin, 2009. "Inflation, Tax Rules, and Capital Formation," National Bureau of Economic Research Books, University of Chicago Press, number 9780226241791, July.
    33. Jacob Mincer & Stephan Danninger, 2000. "Technology, Unemployment, and Inflation," NBER Working Papers 7817, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    34. Ricardo, David, 1821. "On the Principles of Political Economy and Taxation," History of Economic Thought Books, McMaster University Archive for the History of Economic Thought, edition 3, number ricardo1821.
    35. Johansen, Soren, 1991. "Estimation and Hypothesis Testing of Cointegration Vectors in Gaussian Vector Autoregressive Models," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 59(6), pages 1551-1580, November.
    36. Johansen, Soren, 1988. "Statistical analysis of cointegration vectors," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 12(2-3), pages 231-254.
    37. Dominik Stroukal, 2018. "Can Bitcoin Become Money? Its Money Functions And The Regression Theorem," International Journal of Business and Management, International Institute of Social and Economic Sciences, vol. 6(1), pages 36-53, May.
    38. Knapp, Georg Friedrich, 1924. "The State Theory of Money," History of Economic Thought Books, McMaster University Archive for the History of Economic Thought, number knapp1924.
    39. William J. Luther, 2018. "Is Bitcoin Intrinsically Worthless?," Journal of Private Enterprise, The Association of Private Enterprise Education, vol. 33(Spring 20), pages 31-45.
    40. Harald Hagemann & Hans-Michael Trautwein, 1998. "Cantillon and Ricardo effects: Hayek's contributions to business cycle theory," The European Journal of the History of Economic Thought, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 5(2), pages 292-316.
    41. Blau, Benjamin M. & Griffith, Todd G. & Whitby, Ryan J., 2021. "Inflation and Bitcoin: A descriptive time-series analysis," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 203(C).
    42. Hanan Naser, 2017. "Can Gold Investments Provide a Good Hedge Against Inflation? An Empirical Analysis," International Journal of Economics and Financial Issues, Econjournals, vol. 7(1), pages 470-475.
    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. 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.
    2. Bampinas, Georgios & Panagiotidis, Theodore, 2016. "Hedging inflation with individual US stocks: A long-run portfolio analysis," The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 37(C), pages 374-392.
    3. Pooja Joshi & Arun Kumar Giri, 2015. "Fiscal Deficits and Stock Prices in India: Empirical Evidence," IJFS, MDPI, vol. 3(3), pages 1-18, August.
    4. 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.
    5. John D. Levendis, 2018. "Time Series Econometrics," Springer Texts in Business and Economics, Springer, number 978-3-319-98282-3, June.
    6. Gabriel Rodriguez & Pierre Perron, 2013. "Single-equation tests for Cointegration with GLS Detrended Data," Boston University - Department of Economics - Working Papers Series 2013-016, Boston University - Department of Economics.
    7. Marco Morales, 2014. "Cointegration testing under structural change: reducing size distortions and improving power of residual based tests," Statistical Methods & Applications, Springer;Società Italiana di Statistica, vol. 23(2), pages 265-282, June.
    8. Pierre Perron & Gabriel Rodríguez, "undated". "Residuals-based Tests for Cointegration with GLS Detrended Data," Boston University - Department of Economics - Working Papers Series wp2015-017, Boston University - Department of Economics, revised 19 Oct 2015.
    9. Bosupeng, Mpho, 2016. "The Effects of Chinese Interest Rates and Inflation: A Decomposition of The Fisher Effect," MPRA Paper 78160, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 2016.
    10. Rangan Gupta & Amine Lahiani & Chi-Chuan Lee & Chien-Chiang Lee, 2019. "Asymmetric dynamics of insurance premium: the impacts of output and economic policy uncertainty," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 57(6), pages 1959-1978, December.
    11. Chih-Chuan Yeh & Ching-Fang Chi, 2009. "The Co-Movement and Long-Run Relationship between Inflation and Stock Returns: Evidence from 12 OECD Countries," Journal of Economics and Management, College of Business, Feng Chia University, Taiwan, vol. 5(2), pages 167-186, July.
    12. Chien-Chiang Lee & Chun-Ping Chang, 2006. "The Long-Run Relationship Between Defence Expenditures And Gdp In Taiwan," Defence and Peace Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 17(4), pages 361-385.
    13. Lusine Lusinyan & John Thornton, 2011. "Unit roots, structural breaks and cointegration in the UK public finances, 1750-2004," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 43(20), pages 2583-2592.
    14. Omran, Mohammed & Pointon, John, 2001. "Does the inflation rate affect the performance of the stock market? The case of Egypt," Emerging Markets Review, Elsevier, vol. 2(3), pages 263-279, September.
    15. Christopher Spencer & Paul Temple, 2016. "Standards, learning, and growth in Britain, 1901–2009," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 69(2), pages 627-652, May.
    16. Gao, Zhaoxing & Tsay, Ruey S., 2021. "Modeling high-dimensional unit-root time series," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 37(4), pages 1535-1555.
    17. NEIFAR, MALIKA & HACHICHA, Fatma, 2022. "GFH validity for Canada, UK, and Suisse stock markets: Evidence ‎from univariate and panel ARDL models," MPRA Paper 114613, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    18. Narayan, Seema & Smyth, Russell, 2015. "The financial econometrics of price discovery and predictability," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 42(C), pages 380-393.
    19. Muhammad Ahad & Ijaz ur Rehman & Fiza Qureshi & Waqas Hanif & Zaheer Anwer, 2018. "Modelling Asymmetric Impact of Home Country Macroeconomic Variables on American Depository Receipts: Evidence from Eurozone," Annals of Economics and Finance, Society for AEF, vol. 19(2), pages 703-727, November.
    20. Zhou, Bo, 2024. "Semiparametrically optimal cointegration test," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 242(2).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    money; inflation; gold; silver; bitcoin;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • B25 - Schools of Economic Thought and Methodology - - History of Economic Thought since 1925 - - - Historical; Institutional; Evolutionary; Austrian; Stockholm School
    • D46 - Microeconomics - - Market Structure, Pricing, and Design - - - Value Theory
    • E42 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Money and Interest Rates - - - Monetary Sytsems; Standards; Regimes; Government and the Monetary System
    • E51 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit - - - Money Supply; Credit; Money Multipliers

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:ces:ceswps:_9662. 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: Klaus Wohlrabe (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/cesifde.html .

    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.