Gold dipped slightly and rose fast, nothing compared to what happened to say BTC or the big indices. Gold dipped by 10% from its peak when lowest, BTC by 50%
If I had bought gold and btc at their covid lowest I'd be up 30% with gold, and up 160% with btc. That's some serious performance. Some stocks went up like crazy though, for comparison:
I doubt most consider gold to be a worthy long term investment for pure returns as there are products that have performed better than that.
It is extremely good as a currency hedge though. BTC was also touted on the same lines with assumptions like finite supply etc being thrown around. Sure, it bounced back when liquidity returned and now has more returns but that extreme volatility and liquidity crunch period saw BTC fizzling out while gold held up decently well.
