Gold’s best start to the year since 1980 has been good for Josh Saul, a former metals trader who runs a bullion company based next to the Bank of England.

黄金取得自1980年以来最佳的新年开局，这对乔希∠尔(Josh Saul)来说是个好消息。索尔曾是一名金属交易员，现在经营着一家从事金条业务的公司，就设在英国央行(BoE)附近。

He has had to hire 10 temporary staff to deal with the volume of calls to The Pure Gold Company, which he founded.

他创立的“纯金公司”(The Pure Gold Company)不得不雇了10名临时工来处理大量来电。

“We’ve seen a huge increase in the amount of enquires and the amount of people looking to remove exposure to equities, banks, bonds and government debt,” he says.

索尔表示：“我们看到咨询电话大量增加，如今很多人想移除对股票、银行、债券和政府债务的风险敞口。”

That fear has helped push gold out of a three-year downturn, as prices for the precious metal trade at their highest levels in a year. In contrast, global equities have fallen more than 20 per cent since last May, entering a bear market.

这种担忧帮助黄金摆脱了持续3年的低迷，金价升至一年来的最高水平。相比之下，全球股市自去年5月以来跌幅超过20%，进入了熊市。

Last year gold slumped as investors fretted about the Federal Reserve’s first rate rise. Today they are focused on the opposite: the prospect of falling and even negative interest rates .

去年，由于投资者对美联储(Fed)首次加息感到不安，金价暴跌。如今，投资者关注的是相反的情况：利率不断走低、乃至降为负值的前景。

That has prompted fears of a global economic slowdown and a feeling that central banks have run out of tools to stimulate their economies. For long-term gold supporters it is confirmation that central banks will debase currencies in times of crisis. They see gold as a long-term store of value.

这种前景引发了人们对全球经济放缓的担忧，并让他们觉得各国央行已用尽了刺激经济的工具。对长期看好黄金的人士来说，这证实了一点，即各国央行会在发生危机时让本币贬值。这些人士将黄金视为长期的价值储藏手段。

“What’s going to sustain it [gold] is a loss of confidence in central banking, which is just starting,” says John Hathaway, portfolio co-manager at the Tocqueville Gold Fund. “What’s going to drive that is falling stocks. Zero interest rates for all these years has pushed up the valuation of a lot of garbage.”

托克维尔黄金基金(Tocqueville Gold Fund)联席投资组合经理约翰哈撒韦(John Hathaway)表示：“人们对央行丧失信心，这将对它（黄金）起到支撑作用，而这种信心的丧失只是刚刚开始。起推动作用的是股市的持续下跌。这些年的零利率推升了大量垃圾的估值。”

The European Central Bank cut rates to negative in December while the Bank of Japan did the same last month. Sweden cut its rates further to minus 0.5 per cent last Thursday, while Janet Yellen, who chairs the Federal Reserve, said it was studying the feasibility of negative short-term rates.

欧洲央行(ECB)在去年12月将利率降为负值，日本央行(BoJ)上月也做了同样的事情。瑞典央行上周四将利率进一步下调至-0.5%。美联储主席珍妮特耶伦(Janet Yellen)也表示，美联储正在研究短期利率为负的可行性。

Gold has done better than equities, bonds and a broad basket of commodities in a low and falling interest rate environment, according to a JPMorgan analysis of data going back to 1975.

根据摩根大通(JPMorgan)对始自1975年的数据的分析，在利率处于低位且不断下降的环境下，黄金的表现好于股票、债券以及众多大宗商品。

Monthly returns for gold averaged 1.4 per cent during periods of low and falling US real interest rates, compared with a long-run average of 0.4 per cent, according to the bank. It expects gold prices to rise to $1,250 by the fourth quarter of this year.

摩根大通表示，在美国实际利率处于低位且不断下降期间，黄金的月均回报率为1.4%，而其长期平均回报率为0.4%。该行预计，到今年第四季度，金价将升至每盎司1250美元。

Gold’s rise last week was mostly driven by buyers of gold-backed exchange traded funds, which have seen their second-largest inflow of funds in almost six years, according to Bank of America Merrill Lynch.

美银美林(Bank of America Merrill Lynch)表示，上周金价上涨主要受黄金ETF（交易所交易基金）买家推动，流入此类ETF的资金的规模为将近6年来的第二高水平。

These ETF buyers have come from a large geographical base. “Previous periods of accumulation were dominated by North American buyers but purchases this year are more evenly distributed globally,” according to HSBC. “This supports the rally.”

这些ETF买家来自全球各地。汇丰(HSBC)表示：“以前的大量买盘主要来自北美买家，但今年的买盘在全球的分布更为均匀。这支持了金价的上涨。”

The question is whether the price rally can entice physical gold buyers in India and China who, according to the World Gold Council, accounted for 45 per cent of global gold demand last year.

问题在于，价格上涨能否吸引印度和中国的实物黄金买家——世界黄金协会(World Gold Council)的数据显示，去年这两个国家的实物黄金买家占到全球黄金需求的45%。

It will also depend on the mining environment, according to Joe Wickwire, portfolio manager at the Fidelity Select Gold Portfolio. Mine production in 2015 recorded its first quarterly decline and its slowest annual growth rate since 2008, states the World Gold Council.

富达精选黄金投资组合(Fidelity Select Gold Portfolio)的投资组合经理乔威克怀尔(Joe Wickwire)表示，它还将取决于采矿业的境况。世界黄金协会指出，在2015年，黄金产量出现自2008年以来的首个季度下降、以及最慢的年度增速。

“The duration of this move in the gold space is really contingent on supply continuing to come down and the gold industry getting more right-sized,” he says.

威克怀尔表示：“这种黄金走势的持续，取决于供应的持续下降以及黄金行业规模变得更为适中。”

Most analysts caution that such a quick run-up in price is due a correction.

多数分析师都警告，金价如此快速的上涨应该会迎来调整。

“I don’t think we’re in the middle of a sustained bull market,” says David Govett, head of precious metals at London-based broker Marex Spectron. “It only takes a couple of positive economic figures to switch that mentality around and everyone jumps out of the lifeboat.”

伦敦经纪商Marex Spectron贵金属业务主管戴维戈维特(David Govett)表示：“我不认为我们处于一轮持续的牛市之中。只需几个利好的经济数据就能改变人们眼下的想法，到时候所有人都会跳出这艘救生艇。”

Bernard Dahdah, a London-based analyst at Natixis, who was the most accurate analyst last year as ranked by the London Bullion Market Association, predicts gold will drop to just less than $1,000 an ounce later this year if the Fed continues hiking interest rates and the global economy recovers.

法国外贸银行(Natixis)驻伦敦分析师伯纳德达赫达赫(Bernard Dahdah)预计，如果美联储继续加息、而且全球经济复苏，金价会跌至每盎司略低于1000美元的水平。达赫达赫去年被伦敦金银市场协会(London Bullion Market Association)评为眼光最准的分析师。

“If you look at the other fundamentals surrounding gold, I don’t think demand is strong enough to justify a high gold price,” he says.

他说：“你可以看看与黄金有关的其他基本面因素，我不认为需求已经强劲到足以支撑金价保持在高位。”