If tomorrow, the world decided that gold was useless and it could not be used to create anything of value, the price would plummet. Silver held in ETFs hit an all-time high this year. Every few years, the amount of new coins produced is halved. Since the dollar was backed by gold, a currency back by dollars was de facto gold backed. Once our conversation ended, I took to the net and read up as much as I could about Bitcoin. December 29, at pm.