Safe-haven gold gains on renewed Fed cut bets

Gold prices rose on Monday, holding above the $2,050 level on safe-haven appeal from elevated tensions in the Middle East and on renewed bets for an early rate cut by the U.S. Federal Reserve.

Spot gold was up 0.3% at $2,055.30 per ounce, as of 0830 GMT, after marking its biggest daily gain since Dec. 12 on Friday.

U.S. gold futures rose 0.4% to $2,059.20.

The war between Israel and Hamas reached its 100th day as Israel continued its fierce offensive, while Houthi militia threatening response to U.S. air strikes on Yemen kept risks of escalations in the Middle East elevated.

“Gold is just trading as a proxy for front-end yields, which itself is a proxy for amped up expectations of rate cuts in the U.S.,” with the market now looking past the higher-than-expected CPI figures, said Kyle Rodda, a financial market analyst at Capital.com.

Data on Friday showed U.S. producer prices unexpectedly fell in December, sending 10-year Treasury yields sliding in response.

Overall, traders are betting on 166 basis points (bps) of Fed rate cuts this year, higher than Friday morning’s bets of 150 bps.

Traders are pricing in a 79% chance that they could begin as soon as March, according to LSEG’s interest rate probability app, IRPR.

In the run-up to the Fed’s Jan. 30-31 meeting, things look reasonably constructive for gold, provided an absence of anything that proves that the U.S. economy is doing better than everyone’s expecting, said Rodda.

According to Reuters technical analyst Wang Tao, spot gold may break resistance at $2,060 per ounce and rise into the $2,071-$2,079 range.

Spot silver rose 0.3% to $23.23 per ounce, platinum climbed 0.9% to $913.36, and palladium gained 1% to $985.25.