(Kitco News) – Concerns that gold prices were overstretched at $3,000 per ounce proved unfounded as the yellow metal went on another strong run this week, ultimately topping out only $13 short of $3,100 as tariffs, inflation, and geopolitical risk boosted safe-haven flows.
Spot gold kicked off the week trading at $3,024 per ounce, and churned sideways in a relatively narrow $10 channel until the start of Monday's North American trading session knocked it back down to a test of $3,000 by mid-afternoon.
Support held, however, and this would be the last time gold prices would get that close to the round number, as the spot market then spent three days trading between $3,010 and $3,030 per ounce.
Gold's first big move of the week began shortly after 10:00 p.m. on Wednesday evening, with Asian traders driving gold prices above $3,037 per ounce shortly after midnight, and after a pullback to $3,027 at 2:30 a.m. European traders pushed gold all the way to $3,055 per ounce just before 8:00 a.m. Eastern.
Once again, the start of the North American session drove the yellow metal back down to support. But this time, support was just below $3,040 per ounce, and the rebound from that level saw gold set a fresh weekly high above $3,057 just before noon.
As was the case earlier in the week, bullish Asian traders took the reins, and this time they drove gold all the way to a new all-time high of $3,075 per ounce shortly after 10:00 p.m., and $3,087 at 3:00 a.m. Eastern.
By the time the final North American trading session of the week began, spot gold was trading at $3,075 per ounce, with traders content to oscillate between $3,070 and $3085 for the duration of the day's trading.
The latest Kitco News Weekly Gold Survey showed extreme bullishness toward gold’s price potential among industry experts, while retail traders grew only slightly more optimistic about gold prices for the week ahead.
“I am bullish on gold for the coming week,” said Colin Cieszynski, chief market strategist at SIA Wealth Management. “It has broken out to the upside once again and looks technically strong amid a world of uncertainty.”
“That being said, there is the potential for significant volatility next week, particularly around April 2, depending on whether President Trump follows through on his tariff threats or not.”
“Up,” said Adrian Day, president of Adrian Day Asset Management. “Gold broke through the proclaimed $3,000 barrier without blinking. The reasons to buy gold are still intact while there remains a lot of buying potential, from central banks, from the Chinese consumer, and from the North American investor, the last largely untapped yet.”
“Higher,” said Rich Checkan, president and COO of Asset Strategies International. “The ease with which gold blew through $3,000 per ounce after the recent bout of profit-taking suggests strength.”
“Up,” said Darin Newsom, senior market analyst at Barchart.com. “The equation is simple: As long as the geopolitical situation remains status quo, the trend in gold as a safe-haven market will remain status quo.”
“Up,” said James Stanley, senior market strategist at Forex.com. “Bulls haven’t let go of control yet, and I have little evidence to suggest that they will anytime soon. The quarterly cut could be reason for profit taking, but to this point 3k has held support, so I’d still refrain from getting bearish until greater evidence presented itself.”
“Lower,” said Adam Button, head of currency strategy at Forexlive.com. “I expect USMCA to de-escalate global trade tensions and that should lead to a sag in gold. Ultimately, that will be a dip to buy.”
John Weyer, director of the commercial hedge division at Walsh Trading, sees significant upside potential for gold prices next week as tariffs and inflation concerns combine to spook investors into safe havens.
“I think we're going to be higher next week,” he said. “We got some inflationary data today, and continued concerns about tariffs, what they are on, how much, when they're going to be, how much are going to be still out there. And gold becomes a safe-haven play for many.”
Weyer said that even if the tariff talk is de-escalated and markets see a scaled-back version on April 2, gold will still have good reason to rise.
“If [Trump] gives some back, you're still going to be near $3,000,” he said. “Let's say they're a smaller tariff, that still leaves a lot of unknowns out there, what the effects will be down the road. I still think that gives it a reason to stay above $2,900 and around the $3000 area.”
But Weyer believes the more likely scenario is significant tariffs and the fear they bring, which would push gold above this week’s record levels.
“I think we could be at $3,200 or $3,300 if everything that's been projected happens,” he said. “I think we could get there because it's really in front of you then, that it's happening. There still might be some people [today] who are thinking, ‘Maybe it's not going to happen,’ and they're going to be jumping on board as well.”
This week, 20 analysts participated in the Kitco News Gold Survey, with Wall Street bulls taking near-total control after last week’s balanced sentiment. 15 experts, or 85%, expected to see gold prices rise further during the week ahead, while only one analyst, or 5%, predicted a price decline for the precious metal. The remaining two experts, representing 10% of the total, saw further consolidation for gold.
Meanwhile, 202 votes were cast in Kitco’s online poll, with Main Street sentiment improving only slightly from the prior week. 129 retail traders, or 64%, looked for gold prices to rise higher next week, while another 39, or 19%, expected the yellow metal to trade lower. The remaining 34 investors, representing 17% of the total, saw gold prices trending sideways during the week ahead.
Next week’s economic news headlines will be dominated by the Trump administration’s implementation of global trade tariffs on Wednesday, and the March nonfarm payrolls report on Friday morning, with analysts warning that both have the potential to fuel gold’s safe-haven appeal.
Other notable data include the ISM Manufacturing PMI and JOLTS job openings on Tuesday, ADP Employment on Wednesday, and the ISM Services PMI and Weekly Jobless Claims on Thursday.
Marc Chandler, managing director at Bannockburn Global Forex, said the combination of all-time highs and trade tariff uncertainty makes it difficult to bet against gold right now.
“With US trade war intensifying, gold has reached new record highs,” he wrote. “It flirted with $3,000 but held on a closing basis in spot and reached almost $3,086 ahead of the weekend. The next immediate target is $3,100, but it is tough to think about resistance at record levels.”
“Many thought tariffs would be good for the dollar—perhaps both through the rate channel and trade channel,” he added. “DXY is firmer for the second consecutive week, but gold has taken on a life of its own.”
David Morrison, senior market analyst at Trade Nation, noted that the daily MACD indicator continues to push into overbought territory. “But the simple fact that gold remains less overbought than it was six weeks ago has helped to dampen investor concerns over an imminent pullback,” he said. “For now, they seem relatively happy to continue climbing their ‘wall of worry.’”
“So far, profit-taking has led to shallow dips, which have been met with fresh buying,” Morrison added. “But this only increases the probability that there will be a bigger pullback at some stage. If so, would that signal a market top, or could it be a precursor to a more protracted stage of the rally?”
Jesse Colombo, independent precious metals analyst and publisher of The Bubble Bubble Report, said he’s watching the $100 increments in gold futures as key support and resistance levels.
“You can see actually the high in late October was $2,800, it broke through that in late January,” he said. “It pulled back and retested $2,800 in late February, and then it surged through $2,900, and then through $3,000. Now $3,000 is a new support level, and it retested it a few days ago successfully, and then it bounced off of that.”
“Right now, the trend is up,” he said. “I will never short a market, or I will never sell a long position, when you have a market just going up straight from the lower left-hand corner of the screen to the upper right-hand corner of the screen. For me, that's a confirmed uptrend. The momentum is to the upside. So that's my bias, and to me, it looks very good right now.”
Colombo said he’d like to see a daily close above $3,100, but a retest of $3,000 wouldn’t be cause for alarm. “In terms of being worried about being overbought, I'm not worried about that so much, because it had two major consolidations recently,” he pointed out. “It consolidated for much of February, and then it rose from there, then it had a consolidation in late March, and it just popped from there. So the trend is up right now.”
“The gold bull market has been very orderly, and I have not seen signs or any indication of mania at this point,” he added. “For example, it's not going parabolically like a lot of commodities very often do toward the end, the final climax phase. You'll start to see a curve upward, and you'll see volume pickup in a big way. You'll see a lot of churning at that point where you have a lot of retail getting in and you have a lot of smart money institutions selling to those retail bag holders. But I'm not seeing that.”
Alex Kuptsikevich, senior market analyst at FxPro, said gold prices have further upside even as they push deeper into uncharted territory.
“Gold once again updated historical highs after a brief correction at the end of last week,” he wrote. “The reason for the new growth momentum is new tariff wars, which intensify the pull to safe havens that are not linked to any specific country. Also working for gold is the weakening dollar, which goes hand in hand with weakening US stocks. It seems that traders, in this case, are playing back expectations of a softer monetary policy.”
“The current growth is a logical development of the technical picture, which we have described many times before,” Kuptsikevich added. “The expected outcome will be a growth to the area of $3180 in the perspective of a couple of weeks and a rise towards $3400 by the end of summer.”
Analysts at CPM Group are recommending that gold investors stay long or buy, with an initial target price of $3,200.
“CPM would be a willing buyer of gold at today’s record high prices above $3,100 with both a 4-day (trading days) time frame and a one-month time frame,” they wrote. “In between those time frames, we would likely be an ultra-short-term seller, looking for gold prices to pull back to $3,090 or even $3,040 in the middle of April.”
“CPM has stated repeatedly that it expected and still expects gold and silver prices to reach record highs in the first four months of 2025, then subside slightly during the second and third quarters as markets ‘normalize’ their concerns about the heightened economic and political risks in the world,” they added. “Thus, we would buy and stay long through next Wednesday, 2 April, possibly look to take ultra short-term profits after that, but expect to be long going into the last two weeks of April.”
The analysts said gold’s recent price increase “reflected an enormous amount of political and economic uncertainty globally, much of it reflecting economic and politically destructive policy proposals and wild vacillations in such proposals emanating from the Trump Administration.”
“The degree of uncertainty, risk, and anxiety around the world is greater today than at any time since 7 December 1941, and this is being reflected in gold and silver investor buying and prices,” they added.
And Kitco Senior Analyst Jim Wyckoff expects gold’s recent momentum to continue next week. “Still up on safe-haven demand and bullish charts.”
At the time of writing, spot gold last traded at $3,083.30 per ounce for a gain of 0.89% on the day and exactly 2.00% on the week.
