Digital gold could unlock $700 billion in investor demand: World Gold Council

Gold has already moved into tokenized and digitally traded forms, and the World Gold Council is now putting a size on that market for 2031. The forecast sits alongside a much larger demand figure tied to wider adoption, which frames digital gold as more than a niche product. This matters because gold-backed digital products sit at the intersection of a traditional store of value and crypto-style distribution, with the World Gold Council and BCG treating that overlap as commercially significant.

For investors and builders, a larger digital gold market points to more room for tokenized products, custody services, and trading infrastructure tied to gold. If adoption barriers fall, the path to demand looks very different from a market that stays small and specialized. Users who already handle tokenized assets would face more gold-linked products, while firms active in precious metals and blockchain infrastructure would have a larger addressable market to target. (per cryptobriefing.com)

The wider question is whether digitizing gold expands access or simply repackages an old asset inside new rails. Gold has long been used as a hedge and a reserve asset, but tokenization can also concentrate issuance, custody, and redemption risk in fewer hands than direct physical ownership. That tension matters because digital gold is being framed as a bridge between traditional finance and crypto rather than as a replacement for either one.

What remains open is how fast adoption will spread and which products will actually capture the projected demand. The forecast does not show which jurisdictions, platforms, or product designs will dominate, and it does not settle whether users will prefer physical exposure or tokenized exposure. The next proof point will be market take-up in specific digital gold offerings and the extent to which they reduce barriers that still stand in the way.