(Kitco News) - The gold market saw a significant technical and fundamental move last week as prices held critical support at their 200-day moving average and ended a three-week losing streak, even as oil prices continued to climb.
Monday’s follow-through buying momentum has added to gold’s bullish outlook, with one investment bank saying that gold’s disappointing price action through March is unsustainable.
Commodity analysts at Commerzbank said that, despite the significant pullback in gold prices over the past two months, they remain bullish on the precious metal. On Friday, the German bank upgraded its precious metals price forecasts.
The bank sees gold prices ending this year around $5,000 an ounce, up from December’s estimate of $4,900 an ounce. Commerzbank expects the rally to extend through 2027, with prices ending next year at $5,200 an ounce.
Thu Lan Nguyen, Head of FX and Commodity Research at Commerzbank, said in the report that she expects the war in Iran to end before the summer, which will force markets to aggressively reprice rate cuts.
Gold has struggled in part because the war in Iran has created significant supply-chain issues in the global energy market, pushing oil prices significantly higher. Higher energy prices are raising inflation expectations, which markets believe will force the Federal Reserve to maintain its neutral monetary policy stance.
Elevated interest rates have increased the opportunity cost of holding gold.
“We even expect the US Federal Reserve to resume its rate-cutting cycle at the end of this year and to lower its benchmark rate by a total of 75 basis points by the middle of next year. At the same time, US inflation is likely to settle at levels above the inflation target in the coming year. In short: US real interest rates are likely to fall over the longer term, which reduces the opportunity cost of holding gold,” said Nguyen.
Although rising bond yields, driven by shifting rate expectations, and renewed strength in the U.S. dollar have created difficult headwinds for gold, Nguyen said its role as a safe-haven asset has not been diminished.
She added that it is because of the nature of the crisis that gold has not attracted safe-haven flows. However, that does not diminish gold’s role as an important monetary asset in global financial markets.
“A distinction must be made between the nature of the crisis,” she said. “The price of gold rises during crises in which economic risks are the primary focus (e.g., the Great Financial Crisis, the COVID-19 pandemic). In such cases, central banks are generally expected to respond with expansionary monetary policy, i.e., interest rate cuts. In the current crisis, however, the majority is focusing on the inflation shock and therefore anticipates interest rate hikes. This also explains why the Swiss franc, which is normally also a safe haven, has recently been among the underperformers in the G10 currency universe.”
Commerzbank is also bullish on silver, which has struggled alongside gold. The German bank sees silver prices rising to $90 by year-end and climbing to $95 by the end of 2027.
“Fundamental data, such as the tight market, continue to point to a rising silver price,” said Nguyen.
