On Thursday, the metal lost $116 and hit a low of $3,986.85. At the time of publication, the price had returned to $4002. The analytical account Bull Theory estimated the combined losses of gold and silver at more than $1.3 trillion.
The reason is not gold itself. The sell-off spilled over from the US stock market: amid intensifying fears around artificial intelligence, the Nasdaq Composite fell 2.60% and closed at 26,008.86, the S&P 500 lost 1.21%, while the Dow Jones remained almost unchanged - the blow was concentrated in the IT sector.
Justin Lin of Global X ETFs explained to Bloomberg that this was a "liquidity-driven sell-off." In sharp corrections, investors sell gold to meet margin requirements (a broker's demand to add funds to a losing leveraged position) on falling assets.
Physical demand, meanwhile, has not gone away: according to Goldman Sachs, central banks bought 79 tonnes of gold in August, and according to preliminary estimates by the World Gold Council, about 63 tonnes in September, the highest since November 2024. According to Bloomberg calculations, the probability of Fed policy tightening at next week's meeting has fallen below 10%, and this removes some of the pressure from the metal.
Three weeks ago, Amy Gower of Morgan Stanley called $4000 a support level - it was broken. Endeavour Mining CEO Ian Cockerill told the FT that he is no longer confident in that level. Lin identified the next reference point at $3900, Bank of America previously allowed for $3750 with an average fourth-quarter estimate of around $4000.
Did you watch gold fly down $116?
Such a candle on XAU/USD closes in a single session, and the question is usually not about analysis but about nominal. A $116 move on volume that a deposit of a couple thousand allows is a dinner, not a monthly result. The point of prop trading is exactly this: you trade not with your own deposit but with an account allocated by a prop firm after a evaluation stage, and you share the profit with it. While the market looks for support between $3900 and $4000, the mechanics are worth understanding before the next Thursday like this.