Gold prices as material-social actors: The case of the London Gold Fix

Abstract

This opinion piece, drawn from a larger research project on market perceptions of physical gold and gold derivatives, argues that scholars of extractive resources have paid little attention to the pragmatics of prices or looked at prices as material-social actors in their own right. Drawing on literature from the Social Studies of Finance, this essay looks at the global benchmark gold price (formerly the London Gold Fix, now the LBMA London Gold Price) to see how its material and semiotic embeddedness affects its connections to other aspects of gold investment and gold mining.