Looking back at world gold prices last week
Gold prices experienced a volatile trading week as strong recovery in the middle of the week thanks to falling bond yields, weakening the USD and less tough views from the US Federal Reserve (Fed) were largely dispelled in the last session of the week.
The reason comes from the US jobs report being stronger than expected, increasing expectations that the Fed may continue to raise interest rates in September.
Spot gold opened the week at 4,439.15 USD/ounce on Sunday evening (US Eastern time). The precious metal initially suffered pressure as traders continued to assess the impact of last week's strong sell-off, US Treasury bond yields remained high and prolonged concerns about inflation related to oil prices and tensions between the US and Iran.
Gold's decline accelerated in Tuesday's session, as prices broke the 4,300 USD/ounce mark overnight, falling to a weekly low of 4,282.61 USD/ounce before buying power returned.
On Wednesday, gold prices began to recover and increased sharply on Thursday thanks to weaker-than-expected private sector jobs data, cooling US bond yields and less "hawkish" statements from Fed Governor Christopher Waller. These factors caused investors to reduce expectations of an upcoming interest rate hike.
The upward momentum brought spot gold prices back above the 4,500 USD/ounce mark. In Thursday's session, gold prices set a weekly high at 4,511.08 USD/ounce.
However, this recovery momentum quickly reversed on Friday morning after the US's August non-farm payroll report showed the country's economy created 162,000 jobs, significantly higher than forecast, while the unemployment rate remained at 4.1%.
Positive labor market data pushed the USD and short-term US Treasury bond yields back up, while restoring expectations that the Fed would continue to maintain high interest rate policy. This caused gold prices to fall sharply immediately after the report was released, at one point spot gold fell to 4,365.57 USD/ounce.
After that, gold partially recovered from the decline after the jobs report but still could not regain the 4,500 USD/ounce mark. By Friday afternoon, spot gold was traded around 4,432.33 USD/ounce, thereby recording a slight decrease on the weekly chart.
Gold price forecast for next week
The latest weekly gold survey by a precious metals website shows that professional investors on Wall Street are divided into three fairly balanced groups including expectations of gold prices increasing, decreasing and moving sideways after a volatile trading week.
Meanwhile, small investors still maintained a majority of optimistic views, although they have reduced confidence after an unsuccessful breakthrough of gold prices.
This week, 16 Wall Street experts participated in the gold survey. Wall Street sentiment is evenly divided between three groups: investors expecting prices to increase, predicting prices to decrease, and groups that have not yet identified a clear trend.
Among them, 6 experts, equivalent to 38%, predict that gold prices will increase next week. Conversely, 5 experts, accounting for 31%, believe that the precious metal will continue to decrease. The remaining 5 analysts, equivalent to 31%, believe that gold prices may fluctuate in a narrow range with a sideways trend of many fluctuations.
Meanwhile, the survey attracted 220 votes from individual investors. After the downward trend of gold prices, small investors have narrowed their rate of price increase expectations.
120 individual traders, equivalent to 55%, believe that gold prices will increase next week. 53 people, accounting for 24%, forecast that the precious metal will continue to depreciate. The remaining 47 investors, equivalent to 21%, expect gold prices to enter a phase of accumulation or sideways trading next week.
The article only reflects market developments and opinions, forecasts, not investment recommendations. Investors need to consider carefully before making a decision.
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