Gold, They Make Diamonds, Is Gold Next?

 

 

Never forget the power of disruptive technology. Near the end of January, the emergence of DeepSeek as an inexpensive alternative to ChatGPT made headlines across the world. DeepSeek is a Chinese artificial intelligence (AI) startup. Its latest model, DeepSeek R1, is said to be better than its rival's technology in its capabilities and cost far less to create. This underlines how markets can be disrupted by new technology.

Considering how the announcement of DeepSeek roiled markets, imagine what would happen if someone came up with a way to create gold. For years they have made a substitute for natural diamonds, what if they develop a way to make Gold? History is full of people who have tried this with no success.

Years ago, improvements in what are known as synthetic or laboratory-grown diamonds (LGD) started to greatly impact the diamond market. This is one of the reasons today you rarely hear that diamonds are a great investment. Jewelers who are trained gemologists may be able to tell whether a diamond is lab-grown with the aid of a powerful microscope but the only way to be certain is to send it to a gemological laboratory.

While natural diamonds form deep in the Earth and are obtained by mining. Chemically, physically, and optically, lab diamonds are identical to natural diamonds. A synthetic diamond or lab-grown diamond (LGD), also known as a man-made, artisan-created, artificial, synthetic, or cultured diamond, is produced in a controlled technological process. Both have the same hardness, brilliance, and fire.

This brings us to the question of whether lab-grown diamonds are real. Yes, lab-grown diamonds are as real as natural diamonds are. Their only difference is their origin. These are not "imitation diamonds" made of superficially similar non-diamond materials. Synthetic diamonds are composed of the same pure carbon crystallized material as naturally formed diamonds.

This takes us to the crux of this post, It is important to understand that we are in the midst of a technological revolution where barriers are falling and our limits to manipulate atoms is accelerating. Just 26 minutes into this recent panel discussion, Dr. Pippa Malmgren takes off on the remarkable and unlimited changes that are about to take place and she claims they will be happening far sooner than most people think.

Please join me in a peek down a rabbit hole and imagine tomorrow waking up to find that at a fraction of the cost of mining gold, the world could now produce large quantities of gold for very little. We are seeing the boundaries of possibility rolled back by technology and innovation. Whether you call it making, creating, or printing, the idea gold could be cheaply produced would have huge ramifications for its value and the whole economic system. This is especially true if it could be produced rapidly in large quantities at a cost substantially cheaper than it can currently be mined. 

For years gold has been considered the only "real money" by economists distinguishing it from tokens produced by governments to be used in commerce. They point to how unlike fiat currency no sovereign states cannot simply print more gold. Thus we have sayings like "as good as gold." To say the ability to produce huge amounts of gold at a low cost would be a game-changer is an understatement. It would turn global banking upside down and result in a huge transfer of wealth.  

The one thing you can count on is that the ability to cheaply produce a product indistinguishable from gold would give a whole new meaning to the term false gold. Another is that it would have profound implications for those holding their wealth in this precious metal. I'm not predicting this will happen, in fact, I don't see it likely. Still, the message here is we should never underestimate how technological advancements can result in watershed change.

 

(Republishing this article is permitted with reference to Bruce Wilds/AdvancingTime Blog)