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What is Merk Investments?
Merk Investments is an investment firm focused on gold and gold-mining strategies, positioning itself around uncorrelated returns and risk-adjusted performance rather than broad, all-purpose portfolio management. Its stated mission is to help clients achieve superior risk-adjusted portfolio performance through what it describes as a robust investment process.
Its published material centers on two strategy areas — gold and gold equities — supported by research and commentary from CIO Axel Merk and portfolio managers such as Darshan Bhavsar, Peter Maletis and Jamie Holman. The firm publishes chart books, articles and webinar replays (for example, a November 2025 gold miners webinar), and it invites visitors to subscribe to a newsletter.
Who it tends to suit
- Investors looking specifically for gold or gold-mining exposure as a diversifier, rather than a general equity or bond manager.
- People who want the thinking behind the positioning: macro commentary, chart books and recorded discussions.
- Advisers or individuals researching precious-metals allocations who value a named, accessible CIO voice.
Trade-offs to weigh
- Concentration cuts both ways. A gold-focused mandate can diversify a conventional portfolio, but it also means returns depend heavily on one commodity and the miners that extract it.
- Gold miners are equities, not bullion. They carry operational, cost and management risks on top of the metal price, so "gold exposure" through miners behaves differently from holding gold itself.
- Commentary-heavy firms reward readers who follow the research; if you want a hands-off allocation, the volume of macro discussion may be more than you need.
A practical next step: decide whether you want metal exposure or equity exposure, then read one recent chart book or watch a webinar replay to see whether the firm's reasoning matches how you think about the role of gold in a portfolio. If you already hold gold elsewhere, compare overlap before adding a miners strategy. For broader context on gold as an asset class, the World Gold Council at World Gold Council publishes background research.
How can I subscribe to Merk Investments' newsletter or updates?
Merk Investments collects newsletter sign-ups through a "Subscribe To Newsletter" link on its homepage, alongside its Insights & Reports section. That is the primary path for receiving firm updates by email.
Merk Investments
H3: What you can expect to receive Based on the site's own content, updates lean toward:
- Insights & Reports, including chart books and commentary
- Webinar announcements and replays (for example, a gold miners webinar)
- Posts and commentary attributed to CIO Axel Merk and other portfolio managers
H3: If email isn't your preference The same page surfaces other ways to follow the firm's thinking:
- Insights & Reports for published research
- Webinar replays when you miss a live session
- Axel Merk's posts on X, linked from the site
H3: How to decide If you want periodic research and event notices in one place, the newsletter is the straightforward choice. If you mainly want timely market commentary, following the linked social account may suit you better. If you prefer long-form analysis, go straight to Insights & Reports.
Next step: open the homepage, use the "Subscribe To Newsletter" link, and submit your email address.
What are the risks and volatility considerations of investing in gold and gold miners?
Gold and gold miners carry different risks even though they sit in the same strategy family. Gold itself is a volatile asset that can trade like equities for stretches, while miners layer operational and financial leverage on top of the metal. Merk's own material frames this directly: in the page's tweets, CIO Axel Merk responds to a Bloomberg Radio question about whether gold's volatility is typical, saying no — periods of volatility comparable to the S&P are interrupted by periods of substantial volatility, and investors shouldn't assume low volatility is normal. That is his observation, not a formal risk disclosure, but it matches how the asset class behaves.
Where the risk comes from
- Gold price risk: Gold has no earnings or coupon. Its price depends on real rates, the dollar, central-bank demand and sentiment, so drawdowns can be sharp and prolonged.
- Miners add equity risk: Gold equities are companies. Costs, management, mine grades, jurisdiction, financing and dilution all matter, so a miner can fall even when bullion rises.
- Leverage cuts both ways: Mining margins amplify moves in the metal, which is why the page's own webinar title asks whether miners are "bargains or peaking out" rather than treating them as a stable proxy.
- Concentration and liquidity: A gold or gold-equity strategy is a narrow slice of the market. It can be a diversifier, but it is not a substitute for a broad portfolio.
Questions worth answering before you invest
- Are you using gold as a small diversifying sleeve, or as a core holding? The tolerance for volatility is very different.
- Can you hold through a multi-year flat or falling period without selling?
- Do you want metal exposure or equity exposure? They behave differently in a crisis.
- What does the strategy actually hold — physical gold, futures, royalty companies, junior miners? The page lists strategies in "gold and gold mining" and "gold equities," so the mix is a real decision, not a detail.
A practical next step: read the firm's own research before deciding, such as the October Chart Book or the gold miners webinar replay referenced on the page, and compare the framing with independent sources like the World Gold Council at World Gold Council, which publishes volatility and drawdown data for bullion and mining indices. If you want a rules-based, low-cost way to hold the metal rather than the miners, a physically backed fund is a different risk profile entirely.
A quick comparison
| Consideration | Gold | Gold miners |
|---|---|---|
| Primary driver | Real rates, dollar, sentiment | Metal price plus company execution |
| Volatility | High, episodic | Typically higher, with equity-like drawdowns |
| Income | None | Possible dividends, not guaranteed |
| Key extra risk | Storage and tracking method | Costs, jurisdiction, financing, dilution |
For most individual investors, gold works best as a modest, deliberately sized allocation with a stated role — inflation hedge, currency hedge, or crisis ballast — and miners as a smaller, higher-conviction satellite. Decide the role first, then the size, then the vehicle.
How do Merk's investment strategies aim to deliver uncorrelated returns?
Merk Investments frames its approach around one stated goal: helping clients pursue superior risk-adjusted portfolio performance through strategies it describes as aiming to deliver "truly uncorrelated returns" within tailored investment objectives. The uncorrelated part is the distinctive claim — the idea is that returns should come from drivers that don't simply move with broad stock and bond markets.
The concrete building blocks it names are narrow rather than broad:
- Gold — exposure to the metal itself.
- Gold equities — gold mining and related companies.
That is a deliberately concentrated toolkit. Uncorrelated returns here are not presented as the output of a diversified multi-asset engine; they come from a specialized area whose historical drivers — real interest rates, currency expectations, monetary policy shifts, and gold-specific supply and demand — behave differently from the equity market.
The firm pairs those strategies with a research operation. Its Insights & Reports section carries a recurring chart book, commentary, and webinars (including one on gold miners) led by CIO Axel Merk alongside portfolio managers. The public-facing commentary on rates, bond yields, and gold volatility suggests the process is macro-driven: reading policy expectations and market pricing, then positioning within the gold complex.
For a reader deciding whether this fits them, the useful test is whether you want gold exposure as the diversifier rather than as a small satellite. Someone holding a conventional 60/40 portfolio and looking for a few percent of gold may find a dedicated gold and gold-mining manager more concentrated than needed. Someone who already believes gold's drivers are the uncorrelated return source they want gets a specialist rather than a generalist.
Two practical checks before going further: read the current chart book and webinar material to see whether the macro reasoning matches how you think, and confirm the specific strategy's mandate, fees, and liquidity terms directly with the firm, since "uncorrelated" means different things across a physical-gold strategy and a gold-equities strategy. Gold miners in particular carry equity-market and operational risk that bullion does not, so the two lines in the toolkit should not be treated as interchangeable.
What insights does Axel Merk share about Federal Reserve policy and interest rates?
Axel Merk's commentary on the Merk Investments site centers on how Fed communication and rate expectations move markets, rather than on forecasting a single path.
What he emphasizes
- Fed signals matter more than the decision itself. In a September 29 post, he summarized a common thread in Fed speeches as "one more hike this year, but no urgency," citing NY Fed's Williams. He noted market odds for an October hike had shifted to just above 50% from roughly 70% earlier that day.
- Language shapes rate expectations. He referenced Warsh's remark that a "dose of accommodation" had been removed, using it to reinforce the no-urgency framing.
- Rates and equities are linked. In a September 28 post, he described the S&P reacting to a bond selloff, with the 10-year yield (shown inverted) jumping to 5.25% and the S&P selling off intraday.
- Volatility is the norm, not the exception. In September 22 remarks tied to a Bloomberg Radio appearance, he argued that gold's "typical" pattern is periods of volatility comparable to the S&P, interrupted by stretches of substantial volatility—so investors shouldn't assume low volatility is normal.
These are Merk's own observations as posted, not independent reporting.
How to use this
If you follow Fed policy for portfolio decisions, treat his posts as a read on how expectations are repricing rather than as predictions. A practical next step: track the gap between market-implied odds and Fed speakers' language over a few weeks—when that gap widens, as in his October-hike example, rate-sensitive assets like gold and gold equities tend to react first.
For broader context, compare with coverage from outlets such as Bloomberg or official Fed communications at the Federal Reserve.
Should I invest in gold miners now or are they peaking?
The page doesn't answer that question directly — it raises it. Merk Investments' own content is headlined "Gold Miners: Bargains or Peaking Out?", a webinar replay from Nov 13, 2025 featuring CIO Axel Merk with portfolio managers Peter Maletis and Jamie Holman. The fact that a gold-focused manager frames its own flagship discussion as an open question, rather than a recommendation, tells you the honest answer: nobody on that page is telling you to buy or stay away right now.
What the page does establish is where Merk sits in this space. Its stated strategies are gold and gold equities, and its mission language centers on "truly uncorrelated returns" and "superior risk-adjusted portfolio performance." That's a specialist positioning, not a generalist one. If you're considering gold miners, you're considering a narrow, volatile slice of the market — and this is a firm that has built its identity around that slice.
Whose view is on the page
The page includes Axel Merk's own posts, so treat those as his observations, not neutral data. In a September 22, 2026 post he pushed back on the idea that gold's volatility is unusual: his argument is that periods of S&P-like calm in gold get interrupted by periods of substantial volatility, and investors shouldn't assume low volatility is the norm. In a September 28, 2026 post he noted the S&P selling off intraday alongside a jump in the 10-year yield to 5.25%. Read together, his framing is macro-driven: rates, Fed language, and bond moves are the backdrop he watches.
My practical read: that volatility point matters more for miners than for bullion. Miners are leveraged plays on the metal — they carry operational, cost and balance-sheet risk on top of the gold price, so drawdowns tend to be deeper in both directions. "Peaking" is usually a question about the metal's price trend; "bargain" is usually a question about miner margins and valuations. Those can point in opposite directions at the same time.
A decision test you can actually run
Rather than trying to call the top, ask:
- What am I expressing? Bullion exposure and miner exposure are different bets. If you want the metal, miners add equity risk you may not want.
- What's my time horizon? Miners reward patience and punish timing. Money you might need within a couple of years doesn't belong here.
- What's my position size? A satellite allocation you can hold through a 30–40% drawdown is very different from a core holding.
- Can I explain my thesis in one sentence? If it's "it's been going up," that's momentum, not a thesis.
Where to go next
Watch the Merk webinar replay on the site — it's the most direct source for how these managers weigh bargains against peaks, and it costs you an hour rather than a position. For independent context on the metal and the macro backdrop Merk's posts reference, the World Gold Council at World Gold Council publishes free research on gold demand and drivers, and the Federal Reserve's own communications at Federal Reserve are the primary source for the rate expectations Merk is reacting to.
If you're not already comfortable reading a mining company's cost per ounce and reserve statements, start with a broad gold equities fund before picking individual miners — or decide that bullion alone gives you the exposure you actually want.
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