The world is doing what has been its custom throughout the centuries. It falls back on the only real way of preserving buying power. It buys gold. Little wonder that the global gold holdings of exchange-traded funds (ETFs) are topping the 2 000 t mark for the first time in three years. There is a school of thought that claims that the world could get caught with a shortage of physical gold. “We might be heading towards a deficit in so far as physical gold is concerned,” DRDGold CEO Niël Pretorius told journalists on a media visit to the Ergo dump retreatment plant. “Maybe the banks have got ahead of themselves a little bit. Maybe there’s too much paper gold out there and not enough physical gold to cover their position,” he added. If that is so, it should be good for gold, with ETFs the big gorilla in the room.