This is a very valid point. However, the gold:<random currency> markets have been extremely liquid and somewhat transparent for the past thousand years. In the

This is a very valid point. However, the gold:<random currency> markets have been extremely liquid and somewhat transparent for the past thousand years. In the dark ages there was no way for someone to move the *global* gold:wheat chart by 50% just by executing shadowy trades at a single marketplace. Of course this is because medieval markets lacked a great deal of information synchronization, but it was also because medieval markets were actually decentralized.