Am I missing something?Assuming the 'prescribed amount' is the...

Am I missing something?

Assuming the 'prescribed amount' is the face value on a gold coin, then usually there is no problem with the AU value there-in exceeding that at the moment.

oOo

The price of gold is super glued to global debt. Debt is totally out of control, so one day gold is going to flash past $1650 as if it did not exist. There is some short term risk: our dollars could rise at the same rate as gold for a while and negate any short term gain. But the end-game is certain: 75 trillion debt in unfunded Gov. liabilities = 500% of GDP, so The USA have no easy way out.
The EU have a similar problem; so too the UK, and Japan is worse. Steady inflation year-on-year might do some good, but could easily become hyper-inflation. FED belt tightening is unlikely to work given the amounts involved and very-unlikely to proceed given the forth-coming election year making the proposal unpalatable for would-be candidates.