Advisors handicap the race between gold and Nvidia

The horse race between gold and Nvidia (Ticker: NVDA) is on. And financial advisors are increasingly being asked by clients to handicap it.

Investors are in a rare environment where both risk and refuge are rallying, with gold acting as a hedge against policy uncertainty and inflation, and AI-chipmaker NVDA serving as a proxy for growth and innovation. Gold is up 52% YTD, while shares of NVDA are up 44% YTD. Both investments dwarf the S&P 500 return of 15% thus far in 2025.

When safe-haven assets and high-growth names move higher together, it signals that markets are balancing optimism about technology with anxiety about the broader economy, according to Anshul Sharma, Chief Investment Officer at Savvy Wealth.

“Gold’s rise reflects lingering inflation concerns and a search for stability, while NVDA’s ascent highlights genuine structural change driven by AI investment. It’s not necessarily a bubble, but it shows investors are pursuing opportunity while keeping protection in place,” Sharma said.

WIN, PLACE OR GOLD

For most of 2025, gold has been driven primarily by dollar weakness, which in turn has been driven by political concerns, U.S. economic weakness, and the potential for Fed rate cuts. The last couple weeks, the government shutdown has emboldened gold bulls even as the dollar has performed relatively well.

“Generally, I don't think gold tells us much about the broader market away from currencies. However, I think the aggressiveness of gold buying is telling us that a lot of global investors are nervous,” Tom Graff, chief investment officer at Facet said.

Meanwhile, Savvy’s Sharma thinks gold remains supported as the Fed pivots lower, real yields stay subdued, and central banks diversify reserves.

“Its strength looks more like insurance than speculation, a reminder that investors still want balance in portfolios,” Sharma said.

Elsewhere, Dr. Ron Piccinini, director of investment research at Amplify, believes demand for gold will rise as uncertainty around general banking sector health and economic activity increases. On the flip side, if any of these factors decrease in intensity, it is bearish for gold.

“There could be cross effects as well which need to be accounted for, but at the end of the day, we hold gold in our portfolios not because we are bullish on gold, but because of its diversification benefits vs equities and bonds,” Piccinini said.

IS NVDA IN THE HOMESTRETCH?

Nvidia has had a run that would put Triple Crown-winner Secretariat to shame. The stock is up 1,300% in the past 5 years.

Nevertheless, Facet’s Graff is growing fairly worried about a deflating AI bubble that could finally slow it down.

“I think the big players, like Nvidia, will ultimately thrive in the AI economy. However, current revenues are being propped up by a lot of money-losing firms burning through cash. If there's any kind of slowing in the growth of spend, or even just a sign of slightly weaker margins, there could be meaningful downside for the AI mega caps,” Graff said.

Savvy’s Sharma, however, sees NVDA’s surge as a reflection of its central role in the AI buildout, a spending cycle that is unlikely to fade soon. In his view, expectations remain high, which means volatility will come with holding the shares, but its fundamentals remain solid if adoption continues to expand beyond infrastructure into real-world applications.

Stressed Sharma: “The AI theme still has depth, it is simply moving from narrative to execution.”

Amplify’s Piccinini also believes Nvidia has the legs to keep running. He says it is a mega-cap company which attracts large flows due to indexing, which makes it way too dangerous to sell short.

“The rally could continue for a while. Eventually there will be headwinds. Buying GPUs is not enough to compete in the AI race, big firms need to solve for the electrical power generation needs as well, which can only be built at much slower speeds,” Piccinini said.

DON’T BET ON A BUBBLE

Neither move looks like a classic bubble in Sharma’s estimation. In his opinion, gold’s rise rests on fundamentals, while NVDA’s story is tied to real innovation.

“If one were to correct first, it would likely be the high-multiple growth side, driven more by normalization than by a bursting bubble. For now, both reflect a market that remains optimistic yet cautious,” Sharma said.

Neither NVDA nor gold seem to be in a bubble right now, for the simple fact that they really trade like options on something that has immense future volatility, according to Piccinini.

“For gold, that is something of an inflection point in the money printing dynamics of the West. For NVDA, it's like a proxy for the benefits of AI on the economy. Both are likely to change fast - up or down in price - as new information is generated by the market,” Piccinini said.