In this article, you will discover the difference between gold and stocks. We will look at several examples of people and the choices, and what can result with such options. Gain maximum profit, and read this article! Meet John, Mark, and Luke. They all have $5000 to invest. And they each have a route for success. The aim here is financial prosperity, and why not? Why not have something that gives you the lifestyle you choose? Why not provide security for family, live in style or even retire on a nice nest egg. Yes, it may require more than a one off $5000 investment, but this is a snapshot of the lives of these 3 people – John, Mark and Luke. So what is the options that these people go with? Let us delve deeper. First we have John, and he takes the $5000 investment, and invest it all into stock. Stocks fly baby! Now we know what John did, we will return to what happens to his investment in 10 years. Mark takes his $5000 investment, and invests in a mixture of stocks, and gold. Gold? Now this is interesting, it is different than stocks, bonds, and even real estate. Luke takes his $5000 and invests it into gold. He recently read that gold is going to shoot sky high, and invests it all on gold. So now 10 years have passed, and we take a look at John, Mark, and Luke’s investment. It is interesting to look at, because it will help us with our own financial portfolio and strategy for wealth over the long term. A look at John’s $5,000 investment, we find that it ended up being worth $6,000. A good increase or is it? It grew an extra $1000, and a 20% increase, but this works out 2% each year! Remember, when we delve deeper, we find that his investment was based on everyones opinions on stocks. As such, he lost a lot of money, but in the process, learned, where finally he made some profit. A look at Mark, we find that he took a mixture and went for both stocks and gold. He first learned some interesting factors, and probably read some of my articles! He invested 5% into gold, and 95% into stocks. Having a look at the result we find his investment was worth $10,000. It doubled! He would have made more money if he invested all the money into gold, but he played it safe. He also lost some money in the process, while investing in stocks, but because he invested the bulk into stable and growing companies, over the long term he profited immensely. Luke invested all his money into gold. The result is that his investment was worth $6000. He made money, however, he did not make that much. A point to remember is that there are many different kinds of investment, and strategy. For example, John invested all into stocks, but there are so many different stocks out there, that we can’t pin point what is the best options. But remember a mixture is essential of volatile as well as non volatile forms of investment, to succeed at becoming wealthy.