Gold prices rise as dollar, yields drop

The price of gold fell to $ 1,686 an ounce on March 30, then climbed to $ 1,728.40 an ounce on April 1 as the Biden administration announced a $2,5 trillion infrastructure spending plan. The prospect of further stimulus has further raised expectations of higher inflation. Gold tends to benefit from widespread central bank stimulus as it is widely viewed as a hedge against inflation and currency degradation.

Fueled by accelerating vaccine rollouts, a new wave of spending from the Biden administration, and US consumer confidence to a 12-month high, markets anticipated a rapid recovery in the US and therefore global economy. While some recovery is certain, new waves and variants of Covid-19 continue to weigh on the pace of the global economic recovery, which is caps the decline of gold.

Since late January, the US 10 year bond yield has risen from around 1% to 1,66% as of April 9th. A rising 10 year yield generally means a change in treasury bond demand, indicating a shift from investors going from low risk to higher risk. The graph below shows the 10 year yield development YTD.

Gold has often shown to be a great commodity to invest in as a hedge to inflation. It is therefore expected that the downside for gold that is rooted in higher nominal rates will be offset by inflation generated by stimulus checks. This leads us to think that gold currently is in a type of consolidation period encouraging investors to take advantage of low gold prices expected to recover.