Gold has performed excellently this year, as during the upward trend of 2025, gold prices broke through the levels of 3,000 USD and 4,000 USD for the first time in history.
This precious metal has increased in value by about 60% since January 1, 2025.
Gold vs. Bitcoin
Bitcoin, which many see as gold's digital counterpart, has not performed well, as during the same period, the price of the largest cryptocurrency fell by 5%.
This is somewhat paradoxical because the technology that Bitcoin initiated is being used to allow investors to access gold more easily than ever.
What is Tether Gold (XAUT)?
Gold-backed crypto tokens, such as Tether Gold (XAUT), offer anyone in the world the opportunity to add gold to their investment portfolio immediately (but with certain conditions that will be explained later).
XAUT is a gold-backed token issued by Tether, which is also the largest issuer of the world's stablecoin, USDT. In principle, XAUT resembles stablecoins pegged to USD, which crypto investors are quite familiar with. Each circulating XAUT token is backed by one troy ounce of pure gold.
XAUT is available for trading as an ERC-20 token on the Ethereum blockchain and can be purchased from several centralized and DEX exchanges.
These tokens can be exchanged for actual gold directly, but in practice, this will only involve a small number of investors. Those who want to exchange for actual gold must hold tokens equivalent to one gold bar. Tether states that those wishing to exchange for actual gold must have at least 430 XAUT (equivalent to 1.8 million USD at current prices).
Tether launched XAUT in 2020, shortly after Paxos launched PAXG in September 2019. As of this writing, XAUT has tokenized gold valued at around 2.1 billion USD, while the second gold-backed token, PAXG, has a market value trailing closely behind at 1.4 billion USD.
Additionally, it should be noted that Tether is one of the 30 largest gold holders in the world, owning around 116 tons of gold. However, only a portion of this is used to back XAUT, as the circulating token supply corresponds to about 16.2 tons of gold (1,329 bars).
Why do investors choose XAUT?
XAUT is considered one of the easiest ways to access gold as an investment, especially if you are in the crypto world. As long as you have a wallet that supports Ethereum with some funds, you can buy XAUT within seconds on DEXs like Uniswap.
When I bought XAUT on Uniswap, I felt like I had an 'aha' moment similar to when I first entered the crypto world because I could add gold to my portfolio in seconds without going through KYC procedures or complicated processes, making me realize that blockchain technology can indeed create something amazing, even as the community frequently complains about the lack of acceptance.
Of course, you can easily sell XAUT just like buying it, which is much more convenient than selling traditional gold bars. Therefore, it has become one of the most liquid ways to access gold. The XAUT market is open 24 hours a day, and everyone around the world can access it instantly through decentralized exchanges.
XAUT has the advantage of fine unit division. With XAUT, you can experience gold in amounts as small as 0.000001 ounces, which truly makes it accessible to everyone.
Precautions when buying gold tokens in Thailand, such as XAUT.
Even though gold-backed coins like XAUT are a very convenient way to invest in gold, holding them is still not the same as holding real gold.
Most importantly, these coins come with third-party risk, especially gold coins that require trust in the issuer (such as Tether for XAUT) to maintain gold reserves securely and reliably respect redemptions. If the custodian makes financial mistakes, acts fraudulently, or cannot access the gold bars, these coins may lose value, or you may not be able to redeem that value at all.
Moreover, the on-chain structure creates new risks, such as hacking, technical flaws, or issues with smart contracts, which could prevent you from accessing your coins or result in the supply of coins not matching the actual gold reserves.
Converting coins back to real gold or cash is not always straightforward. Sometimes there are minimum amounts required, additional fees, or geographical and legal limitations. And if the market is very volatile, issuers may halt or slow down redemptions, while those holding real gold have complete control, can store it themselves, and sell it whenever they want.
In this article, I primarily focus on XAUT, as it is the most popular gold coin. However, I would like to add that PAXG has very similar functions, and the choice between these two coins often depends on which issuer you trust more (Tether or Paxos).
The future of gold: Investors in Thailand predict new all-time highs in 2026.
Gold in 2025 has proven itself as a 'safe asset' and has once again become one of the most successful investments. The rise of gold is driven by several specific factors, including low interest rates and real yields, geopolitical and trade uncertainties, a significant depreciation of the US dollar, and ongoing demand from central banks around the world.
Additionally, price forecasts for gold using algorithms from CoinCodex, which reference price history, volatility, and broader market trends, predict that gold prices will continue to rise until 2026, reaching a peak of approximately USD6,400.
Although this forecast is quite positive, CoinCodex is not the only source predicting that gold prices will continue to hit new all-time highs in 2026.
The major investment bank Goldman Sachs recently surveyed 900 institutional clients, and 36% of this group predict that gold will reach USD5,000 in 2026, while another 33% provided more cautious forecasts, expecting gold prices to be between USD4,500 and USD5,000, which would also create new all-time highs (while the current record is around USD4,377).
Daan Struyven, head of commodity research at Goldman Sachs, has set a price target of USD4,900, citing central bank buying demand and the Fed's ongoing rate cuts as key factors driving gold prices higher.
Meanwhile, analysts from both JPMorgan and HSBC also tend to predict that gold prices will surpass USD5,000 next year.
