Gold climbed to its highest level in roughly 15 weeks Monday, trading near $4,650 to $4,700 an ounce, even as crude oil fell after the Trump administration unveiled a sweeping new campaign of sanctions against Iran. The divergence underscored how geopolitics and U.S. fiscal policy are pulling commodity markets in opposite directions this week.
Gold extends its rally
Spot gold touched a Monday high near $4,679 an ounce and gold futures reached $4,738.50, according to Forbes, while a separate market wrap from Motley Fool put the metal's settled price at $4,650.64, up 0.76% on the day — the gap reflecting the difference between intraday futures prints and the settled spot benchmark rather than a genuine dispute over direction. Either way, gold has risen sharply since languishing between $4,000 and $4,200 through the summer.
Analysts tied the rally less to Iran than to lingering unease over U.S. fiscal policy. The Treasury Department's move last week to expand long-dated debt buybacks pushed yields and the dollar lower, feeding fresh technical buying in gold. "Gains depend largely on the U.S. dollar remaining under pressure and Treasury yields stabilizing at current levels or declining further," ActivTrades analyst Ricardo Evangelista said, according to Forbes, which also cited Saxo Bank noting the metal had attracted "fresh technical and momentum-driven demand" as it broke out of its summer range.
Crude retreats as sanctions loom
Oil moved the opposite direction. West Texas Intermediate crude slipped to roughly $85 a barrel Monday, down about 2% to 2.5% on the session — prints ranged from $84.89 to $85.86 across trading desks during the day, according to CNBC — as traders weighed Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent's newly announced "Operation Economic Outcast," a campaign of secondary sanctions targeting Iran's oil, shipping, gold and aviation trade.
Bessent said the campaign was designed to "sever every economic pipeline" Iran relies on "until Tehran stands alone," according to NBC News, warning that any entity found laundering money for Tehran would be "removed from the U.S. dollar system." The sanctions add to pressure on crude, which has now fallen for two straight sessions after briefly extending a two-week rally.
Traders are also watching for Canada's promised retaliatory tariffs, set to take effect Sept. 8 on a matching $20 billion of U.S. goods after trade talks with Washington collapsed last week — a dispute that threatens to complicate North American energy and industrial trade flows in the weeks ahead.
