ELI5: Explain Like I'm 5

Gold exchange-traded product

Okay kiddo, have you heard of gold? It's a shiny yellow metal that people really like and think is very valuable.

Now, there are some special things called gold exchange-traded products, or ETPs, that let people buy and sell gold very easily without having to physically store the gold themselves.

Basically, a company or organization creates an ETP that represents ownership in a certain amount of gold. People can buy and sell these ETPs just like they would buy and sell stocks.

When someone buys an ETP, they're essentially buying a small piece of the gold that the ETP represents. So if the ETP represents 10 ounces of gold and someone buys one share of the ETP, they own a small portion of that gold.

When the price of gold goes up, the price of the ETP will go up too, and people who own shares in the ETP can sell them for a profit. And if the price of gold goes down, the ETP will go down in value too.

So instead of having to physically buy and store gold, which can be expensive and difficult, people can buy and sell ETPs that represent ownership in gold. It's like buying a very small piece of a shiny yellow treasure without having to actually hold it in your hand. Pretty cool, huh?