While the density of cash is certainly useful, using cash brings all of the benefits of having your wealth denominated in a state backed currency, instead of a

While the density of cash is certainly useful, using cash brings all of the benefits of having your wealth denominated in a state backed currency, instead of a commodity whose prices is more heavily driven by supply and demand. Oh, also how the hell are you going to spend your gold? Black markets and crime must interface with the rest of the world at some point, so you're going to have to change your gold to cash, which is now just a choke point for your operation to get pressured at. There aren't a lot of businesses that take in gold and output money which makes laundering difficult. But you're right. These arguments are almost certainly not primarily motivated by crime prevention.