Is September a good month to buy gold?

We all know the proverb on the stock market that goes something like this: "go away in May, but remember to come back in September". This may work in the stock market, but is there such a thing for gold? We delved into the statistics and made an overview of the monthly returns of both gold and the US S&P 500 stock market index.

What does it show? From 1970 to 2013, September was the best month to step into gold. Over this period of more than thirty years, the Gold price during this month by an average of more than 2.5%! This is significantly better than in the rest of the year, in which the monthly return only exceeds 1.5% twice. Those are the months of January and November.

The worst months for gold were March and June, when investors saw the value of gold fall slightly on average. The anecdote that gold performs especially well in autumn and winter (due to seasonal demand from India) is confirmed by this graph. From November to February, gold provides good returns. Only October is disappointing with an average return of just over 0%.

Stocks vs Gold

If we look at the stock market, we see that it is having a particularly weak summer period. From June to September, the average monthly return gets worse and worse, only to make a good comeback in the fourth quarter. In this graph we can clearly see the effect of the stock market wisdom with which we started this article. There is no such stock market wisdom for gold, but September turns out to be by far the best month for the gold price.

Disclaimer: Hollandgold does not provide investment advice. Do your own research before investing in stocks or gold. Past performance is no guarantee of future results.