Gold and silver prices continued their gains during trading on Monday, with the yellow metal trading slightly above the $5,000 per ounce level, benefiting from the decline of the US dollar, as investors await important US data on the labor market and inflation later this week to gain a clearer view of the path of interest rates.
Gold rose 1.3% in spot trading to $5,025.97 an ounce, after jumping nearly 4% on Friday.
US gold futures for April delivery also rose 1.4% to $5,048.30 an ounce.
Kelvin Wong, senior market analyst at OANDA, said the current moves may reflect a very short-term intra-session correlation between the dollar and both gold and silver, which is driving the prices of the two metals higher.
The dollar's decline is supporting gold and bringing buyers back to the market.
The US dollar hit its lowest level since February 4, making dollar-denominated metals cheaper for buyers outside the United States. Meanwhile, the Japanese yen strengthened following Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi's victory in Sunday's election.
Tim Waterer, senior market analyst at KCM, said that the search for bargains also contributed to pushing gold back above the $5,000 per ounce level.
Investors are awaiting the release of monthly US employment and consumer price reports this week, amid expectations of at least two interest rate cuts of 25 basis points each during 2026, with the first cut likely to occur in June. Gold, which does not offer a yield, typically benefits from low interest rate environments.
The labor market and interest rates are under scrutiny… and gold awaits the signal.
Waterer added that any weakness in US jobs data could help gold bolster its current recovery efforts, noting that markets do not expect an interest rate cut by the Federal Reserve before mid-year, unless employment data shows a very sharp decline.
In the same vein, Mary Daly, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, said on Friday that she believes one or two more interest rate cuts may be necessary to counter signs of weakness in the labor market.
In the silver market, the spot price rose 4.7% to $81.55 an ounce, after gains of nearly 10% in the previous session. Silver had reached an all-time high of $121.64 an ounce on January 29.
Kelvin Wong explained that unless silver can break through the key resistance level at $92.24 an ounce, he does not see – from a probabilistic perspective – clear confirmation of the formation of a medium-term uptrend.
In other precious metals, platinum rose 0.2% in spot trading to $2,099.15 an ounce, while palladium climbed 1.3% to $1,728.0 an ounce.
