What is the Gold Spot Price? (Updated 2024)

Gold spot price history

As with any commodities market, the price of gold can change dramatically on surges in supply and demand. Gold is also particularly sensitive to geopolitical risks, social upheaval and stock market shakeups. Headline news events to that effect can result in dramatic swings in the spot price for gold.

A look at gold's price history over the past 30 years shows that the precious metal does especially well during times of uncertainty as investors look for safe-haven investments.

Steady economic growth in the mid-1990s led to a drastic decline in the gold price, which slid from around US$410 per ounce to about US$288. But during the 2008 financial crisis, gold's safe-haven status became increasingly apparent as the metal spiked to US$869.75.

The spot price for gold would later reach more than US$1,900 on September 5, 2011, as investors grew increasingly concerned that the US would default on its debt; at the time that was gold's highest price ever.

In the following decade, the gold spot price saw peaks and troughs. Halfway through 2013, tit took a dive to the US$1,220 level, and it remained between US$1,100 and US$1,300 from 2014 to early 2019.

Since then, it has more than doubled. This began in the second half of 2019, when a weaker US dollar, increasing geopolitical tensions and slowing economic growth sent gold prices above US$1,500.

In 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic threw the global economy into a tailspin, with the gold price adding more than US$500 to its value in the first eight months of the year, breaking US$2,000 for the first time.

Russia's invasion of Ukraine and continued economic uncertainty lent a hand to gold in early 2022, pulling the yellow metal up to a then-record price of US$2,074.60 in March. However, it plummeted through much of the year to below US$1,650. 2023 was stronger for gold on the back of banking instability, high interest rates and the breakout of war in the Middle East.

2024 has been a strong year for the gold spot price, which has broken through multiple fresh levels throughout the year on fears of a looming US recession, the promise of Fed rate cuts on the horizon and the worsening conflict in the Middle East and the US election.

By mid-March, gold broke through the US$2,200 level, in April it moved above US$2,400 and in early August it broke through US$2,500 for the first time, hitting a new high of US$2,530 later that month.

Learn more about the gold spot price

Ready to build your gold spot price knowledge? For a deeper dive into the mechanics of gold's price movements, check out our article Follow the Money: A Guide to Gold Technical Analysis.

How high could the gold spot price go? In the past few years, gold market analysts have put forth eyebrow-raising gold price forecasts. Will the price of gold break the US$3,000 level? Will gold push past US$4,000 to US$5,000? Could US$8,000 or even US$10,000 gold become a reality sometime in the near future?

See the Investing News Network's interviews with Brett Heath, Peter Grandich, Brien Lundin, Rob McEwen, Frank Holmes, Gareth Soloway, Don Durrett and others who are bullish on gold.