Stock-to-Flow Debunked: Why Silver Outscores Gold But Still Underperforms
Show Notes
In this dense and data-rich episode, Matthew continues his takedown of the Stock-to-Flow (S2F) model by dissecting the inconsistencies in how it’s applied to gold and silver. He compares compound annual growth rates (CAGR), doubling times, stock-to-flow ratios, and market caps—emphasizing that silver, despite having a higher S2F than gold (74 vs. 59), delivers weaker long-term price growth. He stresses the importance of using consistent data treatment, pointing out how PlanB's original S2F model arbitrarily discounted silver’s jewelry stock while fully counting gold's, leading to misleading conclusions. Matthew also shows how market cap growth is simply the sum of price growth and production growth, not some magical function of scarcity. He concludes that while stock-to-flow ratios may sound mathematically elegant, they lack predictive power and are often applied with inconsistent methodology. As a preview, he teases his own upcoming cross-asset S2F model that includes Bitcoin—using rigorously defined and transparent inputs. Porkopolis Economics - Episode 187 Chapters: 00:00:13 - Analyzing Stock to Flow for Gold and Silver 00:03:54 - Silver vs Gold: Stock to Flow Analysis 00:06:20 - Analyzing Silver Market Trends 00:09:43 - Understanding Silver and Gold Market Cap 00:16:49 - Understanding Doubling Time and Gold 00:18:03 - Understanding Stock to Flow in Gold 00:20:26 - Valuing Silver and Gold Comparatively 00:25:47 - Analyzing Silver's Stock-to-Flow Ratio 00:27:33 - Understanding Silver Market Cap 00:31:13 - Silver Stock to Flow Analysis 00:33:21 - Consistency in Gold and Silver Analysis 00:34:19 - Comparing Gold, Silver, and Bitcoin Show Sponsors: Trezor - https://trezor.io/ Debifi - https://debifi.com/ Donations to Porkopolis Economics via BTCPay are appreciated: https://donations.porkopolis.io/ Porkopolis Economics covers macroeconomics, money, geopolitics and sports from the creator of the Crypto Voices podcast, Matthew Mezinskis. Data-driven. Scale matters. Smaller, decentralized states means more opportunity for liberty than larger ones. Host: Matthew Mezinskis https://porkopolis.io https://x.com/1basemoney Show content is not investment or financial advice in any way.
