Continuing it’s incredible year of record breaking, gold hit a new historic milestone Friday, breaching $2,500 per ounce spot price for the very first time.
2024 has seen multiple new records, and having spent much of 2023 below $2,000 per ounce, it cannot be understated how impressive gold’s rally this year has been, gaining more than 20%, and now surpassing this key psychological threshold.
Gold hit $2,500 Friday and still appears to have support at this historic high.
Gold has been testing $2,500 for a few weeks now, inching closer, but Friday held the key and saw gold finally break above this level for the first time, and scoring a record close for the weekend of $2,509. Despite some initial weakness on open that saw gold dip back below $2,500 it seems there is still support behind gold, which is trading at $2,520 at the time of writing.
Geopolitics remains an important near-term driver, with Ukraine’s incursion into Russia, and the potential for escalation in the Middle East. US interest rates also look almost certain to be cut by the Federal Reserve in September, with Fed officials on Monday saying now is the time to start considering cuts.
The rate cuts may be priced-in, and has already pushed the US dollar index to its lowest in 8 months, giving gold the final bump it needed to hit $2,500. In other currencies gold is also at or near new records. In GBP, gold is at £1,936 per ounce, less than £20 off the UK record. In Euros gold is trading at €2,273, about €14 from the all-time-high.
Silver has also benefited from the weaker dollar, and has gained over 6.5% in the past week and retaken $29 per ounce to trade at $29.62 at the time of writing. With the gold-silver ratio still elevated at 85, silver still has some catching up to do after it's recent pull back.
With the near-term outlook still positive for gold, and the US election just 11 weeks away, the question now is how high will gold go in 2024. The pace of gains already make $2,600 or $2,700 seem entirely plausible, but gold has already traded outside of it’s normal ranges this year and could perform even better.
