Really the problem is the lack of reinvestment of dividends. If they'd reinvested their 2.5% every year, in a similar bond paying 2.5%, then they'd now be coll

Really the problem is the lack of reinvestment of dividends. If they'd reinvested their 2.5% every year, in a similar bond paying 2.5%, then they'd now be collecting dividends of something like $600,000/year... absolutely crushing holding Gold. The fact that this is a perpetual bond is interesting, but rolling an investment through shorter-dated bonds paying 2.5% over the centuries would have achieved a better result.