In late October, the gold price hit an all-time high on the London Bullion Market of USD 4346.50 per troy ounce. After stripping out the effects of inflation, it has risen in real terms more than tenfold since the convertibility of the US dollar into gold was suspended by President Nixon in August 1971. Aside from looking nice, gold does not offer investors much in the way of an income stream. As a physical commodity, however, it can be attractive in times of heightened uncertainty, particularly regarding the inflation outlook. A simple model of the real gold price might include the real rate of interest, the rate of inflation, and a measure of inflation volatility on the right-hand side. These sorts of models did a reasonable job of explaining movements in the real gold price up until the turn of the century, but their explanatory power has fallen by about a half since then. What is missing? Fathom finds that adding a measure of the debt-to-GDP ratio across the G7 improves the fit of its gold price model considerably. Nevertheless, current valuations look stretched even allowing for high levels of government indebtedness. Does that mean gold is necessarily overvalued? That is one of the questions Fathom shall address in its upcoming Global Outlook, Winter 2025.