FTFY

/10char

 

Stuff to gold is the classical use of the philosophers stone. The big thing in book one was elixir of life. Its completely possible that any wizard can turn any object into gold. I mean turning non-metallic objects, matchsticks, into metallic objects, needles, was the very first transfiguration lesson. Given that galleons wouldn't hold there value from their base materials but from the worth the society pegs on them, kinda like all paper money.

Finally considering how the ministry seems to treat keeping the wizarding world secret from muggles as job number one maybe its illegal to create gold with the purpose of selling it to muggles. I'm remembering a scene in book one where Hagrid tells Harry not to buy a golden cauldron because he won't have a use for it. This tells us that Harry had enough money on him to purchase what would be priceless under today's gold rates. Even with the restriction on Galleons that only the goblins can make or destroy them, reselling golden equipment seems like an easy racket. Unless of course its very illegal.

 

Directly from PS ch13 (No pg number because this is from a pdf ebook and I don't have a paper copy of the book handy)

So, yeah.

As for the whole 'maybe any wizard can just transfigure gold' thing, well, given the wording in that passage describing the stone's 'astonishing powers' I inferred that the stone's ability to transform metal into gold was in some way unique and/or impressive.

Just my take on it.

 

It's not like she made it up - the Philosopher's Stone makes gold and Elixir of Life the same way a phoenix is immortal or a hippogriff is a horseybird. If the Philosopher's Stone doesn't fit exactly in the HP world, it's because it's existing mythology that's been transplanted.