In that question, the author announces his complete ignorance of the issue. It's not that metals are "accreting value". It's that the measuring stick you are using to measure value is changing. The author has a fundamental misunderstanding of what money is and a complete lack of historical perspective on the "great" Keynesian experiment that's in it's dying days. Everyone loves the returns on a Ponzi scheme until it collapses.
Lol yup.
Same thing could be said for anything:
"Why would oil, a commodity with no yield -- accrete value?"
Some people are so ignorant of economics and prices, its so sad.
Both posts make excellent points, but they do not take into account the circumstance under which such commodities actually do accrete value.
What you both were addressing was the monetary inflation aspect. Silver, for example and all else equal, retains it market value while the currency declines. That is clearly no accretion of value.
However, market values for silver can in fact rise even with perfect money as the only currency due to increased demand.
If, for example, a superconducting medium were invented that would operate up to, say, the boiling point of water at standard pressure, you can bet you hide that silver would accrete staggering value. The same might be said for any other comparatively rare commodity. But even sand, were it to be the magic ingredient in the next wave of quantum advances that everyone in the world will want, its market value would rise.
So always bear in mind the two disparate foundational bases for rises in apparent value: money inflation and increased demand. Same outward appearance; totally and mutually alien foundations and, often, results.