While Indian households collectively hold about 3 billions of dollars in gold, there is still a large part hidden in lockers, doing little to support economic growth. Nithin Kamath, co-founder and CEO of ZerodhaThink that this vast inactive active could play a much more productive role.
“We need better ways to financialize this gold beyond simple gold loans,” said Kamath, noting that actions, on the other hand, finance companies directly and help advance the economy.
Indian households hold about 3 billions of dollars in gold (estimate of the golden council world), sitting inactive in lockers. Meanwhile, investments in equity finance the companies that need capital to grow. We need better ways to financialize this gold beyond simple gold loans. pic.twitter.com/j0d4Di0Boi
– Nithin Kamath (@ nithin0dha) October 7, 2025
To illustrate its point, Kamath shared a graph comparing the annual gold yields and the NIFTY 500 index from 1996 to 2025. The data emphasizes that the actions have surpassed gold in 24 over 30 years, demonstrating their stronger potential to generate long -term growth.
Historical data show that gold and actions have experienced periods of strong earnings and steep drops. The NIFTY 500 has delivered three -digit yields in several years
-101% in 2003, 105% in 2004 and 91% in 2009 -but also had strong losses of -57% in 2008, -22% in 2001 and -26% in 2011.
Gold, on the other hand, has provided stable yields but moderate over the years, with notable peaks of 32% in 2011, 27% in 2020 and a 16% expected in 2024 and less negative years compared to the shares. The year 2020 stood out as an aberrant value, when the two assets increased in the middle of the world pandemic – the NIFTY 500 won 16% while gold increased by 27%.
According to UBS Securities India. This stock is worth around 2.4 billions of dollars, which is 56% of India’s nominal GDP during financial year 26 and even higher than total bank credit, which represents 55% of the economy.
Chief economist of UBS Tanve Gupta Jain recently declared in a note that gold prices could further increase, the view of the Maison du Cartage projecting $ 3,500 an ounce during the year 26. The metal briefly crossed this brand in April of this year, affecting $ 3,501 per ounce.
Earlier, HSBC Global observed that Indian households now have more gold than the combined reserves of the 10 world central banks, including the United States, Germany, China and Russia. In comparison, the Bank of India reserve held 876.18 tonnes of gold in December 2024.
Kamath’s remarks, associated with these figures, highlight a long -standing challenge – how to channel India’s love for gold in productive financial assets that can help fuel the history of the country’s growth.
